willow the astrophysicist
by pezgirl1
Summary: StargateBuffy XOver: What if Xander had persuaded Willow to wear a soldier costume on season two's Halloween? What if she had become a certain blonde astrophysicist from SG1? What if Xander was caught in a similar situation? please R&R and i'll post more.
1. Chapter 1

Willow shook her head for the hundredth time that evening, why had she let Xander talk her into wearing this thing?

It didn't even suit her, this shade of green really wasn't her, neither was the uniform. She had only worn the stupid thing because her bestest buddy ever hadn't wanted to be the only soldier in the gang.

She huffed; she didn't even get a gun.

So she was dressed in these army-style pants, a black shirt and a green jacket and also, as if it couldn't get any worse, this great fat helmet thing.

Willow whimpered and thought that it made her head look big.

"It doesn't look that bad, Will," assured her other best friend Buffy, patting her on the shoulder.

Buffy was wearing a really beautiful dress and had a black wig on, she looked good.

"But it's really not me," she said wanting to yank the helmet off her head.

"I told you Willow, that's the whole point of Halloween- to be someone other than who you are." Then she smirked at her, "Besides, it was either that or the hooker outfit."

Willow made an indignant sound, going pink-faced. The blonde grinned, "Sorry Will."

Well, it was definitely better than the hooker outfit- that REALLY wasn't her.

"Hey, hey! Girls!" they turned and saw Xander running towards them and was also dressed as a soldier and grinning goofily while carrying a toy gun in his left hand.

"Hey Xand!" greeted Buffy enthusiastically.

Willow gave her dark haired buddy a weak smile and looked at her uniform morosely. "You look- okay", he said, "It's a little baggy on you though."

Buffy rolled her eyes at Xander's lack of tact.

Willow glared at Xander and her face went a darker shade of pink, and the dark-haired teenager put up his hands in a gesture of peace, "Hey, no offence!"

Buffy snorted, "Xan, it was your idea that she should put on the outfit, besides I think she looks great."

Buffy and Willow poked their tongues out at Xander who blushed and shrugged and then said, "You want my gun?"

Willow looked at him and smiled in amusement, "Xander! That's just a toy!"

He looked sheepishly at her, "It kinda looks like a real gun."

Willow just grinned looking amused and shook her head while Xander blushed.

"Guys?" they looked at Buffy. "I think we should go over to the kids now."

"Oh yeah," remembered Xander with a start.

They walked towards the throng of excited children in their costumes and hoped that they wouldn't get too hyped up on sugar while they were looking after them.

Buffy rolled her eyes slightly; she was going to make Snyder pay for this, that guy was unbelievably evil.

Xander then asked, "You don't think any demons will you know- attack?"

"I asked Giles, apparently they stay in on Halloween," said Buffy looking glad. "How strange is that?"

"Well, that's good 'cause I was expecting a big bad demon to pop up," said Xander in relief.

They eventually split up and went with a group of kids each; Willow guided the giggling kids up the stairs to the front door of a house and rung the door bell for them.

The door opened and an elderly woman stepped out, "Oh my, you do look scary!" she exclaimed humorously at the kids.

"I'm afraid I haven't got a lot of candy left-

Then something strange happened, the kids began swiping and growling at the old lady who gave a fearful little shriek and went back into her house and locked the door quickly.

Willow looked shocked and upset, "Hey stop it!"

They weren't listening; she didn't think that sugar was this bad with kids.

Then she gasped and felt something shoot through her and then everything went black, she collapsed and lay on the floor for a moment.

Who woke up next was an entirely different person, but still wearing Willow's body and was pretty damn confused.

Willow's form slowly got up off the ground and then looked around at the chaos, there were little demon-looking creatures running around terrorizing people.

She saw one of the creatures run passed her and then stare at her briefly before taking off, the redhead gaped in shock and looked confused.

"I don't remember going through the Stargate," she said confused. The she felt a nudge and looked down at a red alien- well, it must be an alien.

What else could it be? Goa'uld's maybe?

It growled at her, baring its little sharp teeth and its eyes went deep, dark black, "Holy Hannah!"


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter two

Xander realized that he should have known that just because the happened to be Halloween night didn't mean that it would be lacking in the violence of the supernatural, this was the Hellmouth after all and nothing ever went as planned.

As he stood in the street he watched in stunned puzzlement, the kids starting acting like menaces, only he didn't think that it was the sugar that was doing this.

He was just about to try to react when he felt something crash into him, he reeled back slightly; then the world as he knew it went black.

Oddly enough the form of Xander Harris remained standing, his head and shoulders sagged and it looked as if he was worn out, then he slowly rose his head and started observing what was going on around him.

"Ookay," he said slowly, he raised his gun slightly and assessed the situation; there were short inhuman aliens running around terrorizing people, he looked around looking for his team.

They weren't there, come to think of it he couldn't even remember going through the 'gate. Maybe the Goa'uld were messing with his head, he knew he had to find SG1 asap.

He angled his gun to protect himself and went off in search of his kids; he needed to find out what the hell was going one.

He jogged up the dark street aiming his gun as he went at the possible threats, then he saw one of the little alien dudes scaring an old man, unable to ignore this he aimed his gun at it and pulled the trigger.

The shot grazed the alien's shoulder as it changed its position, "For cryin' out loud," he muttered as the red coloured alien ran off.

"Hey!" he span around and came face to face with some redheaded girl, he angled the gun at her.

The kid didn't look like she was about to attack him, but still, you couldn't be sure.

The girl was dressed in military uniform and a helmet, but she looked like she was playing dress-up, he was instantly reminded about his deceased son as he remembered the occasions when his kid dressed as a soldier and saluted him.

The usual raw emotional pain jabbed at him and he had to push it away before it distracted him, he needed to find out if the kid was a threat or in trouble.

But they were in the middle of a battle ground and it wasn't the time for a conversation, so he settled for keeping a close eye on the kid, "Hey, kid, it's pretty dangerous out here so why don't you go and run for cover."

The redhead, who looked barely two years older than Cassie, gave him a strange look and said, "_Kid_?!"

They both jumped as the trash cans crashed loudly to the ground, a purple alien growled and hissed as it threw the cans out of its way and then it came towards them looking about as unfriendly as the ever-annoying Snakeheads.

Jack grabbed the kid and pulled her behind him ignoring her protests and almost forgetting that she could very well be a threat as well. He pointed his gun at the purple guy.

Then they both heard a terrified scream, Sam in Willow's body turned around and saw two ugly-looking alien walking menacingly towards a dark-haired teenager dressed in a 18th century dress and looking pretty damn scared.

Sam heard the dark-haired military boy curse and a gunshot ran out, she turned and saw that the purple alien was now running down the street fast with blood on its forearm.

She moved quickly to avoid being hit by the gun as the teenage boy pointed the weapon towards the aliens who were getting closer to the brunette adolescent; he was going to shoot when another three aliens decided to attack the other two.

Jack shook his head in confusion and decided to get the hell out of the dodge; he grabbed the redhead and made his way to the brunette who they both noted was on the ground after fainting.

They dragged her to the foot of a large tree and they both hoped that she would regain consciousness soon; the gun that was being used was probably already low on ammo.

The entire situation confused Sam who hadn't been able to find out what was going on or how she had gotten to this planet, she was even more confused that she was being commanded by a guy that was almost young enough to be her son. He sounded so military that she wondered if he was a soldier.

There was also another situation that confused even more; she was pretty damn sure that she wasn't in her own body, the hands weren't hers- they were smaller that her own and Sam was pretty sure that she had shrunk about four inches.

And then there was her hair; red, last time she checked she was a blonde, which made her wonder what the hell was going on.

Hopefully she'd find out and then she could work on how to get her team back and how to get them back to Earth.

Sam was kneeling over the teenager who was now waking up, "Are you alright?"

"What?" the kid sounded bewildered, probably scared out of her mind.

"Are you hurt?" asked the soldier-boy giving them a brief glance over his shoulder.

"What's happening?" she asked confused.

"You'll be okay, just stay down," replied Sam trying to calm the kid down.

"I don't understand," she said nervously. "Who are you?"

"We're not going to hurt you," reassured Sam. "What's your name?"

"Elisabeth," she answered sounding British.

Jack was listening in on the conversation and he felt that maybe the he and redhead were on the same side, he wasn't sure about Elisabeth but she sounded so frightened that it was kinda hard to be suspicious.

But he was a soldier and he had his team to look for, so he would keep an eye on the both of them because it was in his job description to be on guard at all times.

"This is a strange place," said Elisabeth who was sounding increasingly upset. "How did I come to be here?"

Sam didn't know what to say, she turned to the soldier-boy seconds before hearing the girl scream and the growls of the alien who had green skin and a pair of nasty-looking horns on its head.

Sam pulled the teen away from the hostile and gave it a roundhouse kick to the face; it teetered for a second before slumping to the ground in a heap.

She heard another scream from the girl and turned to see her using the dark-haired boy for cover, "A demon, a demon!" she shrieked in fear.

She looked for the 'demon' and saw nothing but a car coming towards them with its headlights on, hadn't this girl seen a car before? It was on her home-planet after all.

She turned to the girl, "It's not a demon," she said. "It's a car."

The girl swallowed and said in a small voice, "What's it want?"

"What's she saying?" asked the soldier-boy who she still no the name of.

"She doesn't know what a car is," replied Sam in bemusement.

"She's never seen a car?" he said not liking the situation they were in, still he and SG1 had gotten through worse.

But his kids weren't here, and he didn't know where he was.

"You have?" Sam asked him sounding confused.

Sam had thought that the two kids were from this planet, but what if they weren't?

"You two are from this planet, right?" asked Jack.

"I'm not from this planet?" clarified Sam. "Are you?"

He shook his head while Elisabeth looked at them as if they were crazy.

Sam shook her head and looked around at the destruction, "We should get inside."

Jack nodded, he entirely agreed with the kid.

"Hey," he put a hand on the redhead's shoulder. "What's _your _name?"

Sam smiled, "Major Carter, but I'd go with either Sam or Carter."

She turned away barely noting that her reply had left him speechless, she led Elisabeth towards an abandoned house and then turned back to the soldier-like boy, "What's yours?"

"Oh, um, Jack, Jack O'Neill."

Willow's eyes went wide.

Jack swallowed, "Carter?"

"Colonel?"

"What the hell is going on here?"


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter three

The door to the empty house was flung open; Jack leaned against the door frame and checked inside the house before saying, "All clear."

Sam and Elisabeth followed Jack into the house; they looked around curiously, the redhead walked further into the house and then turned to the brunette girl, "You wouldn't happen to know who lives in this house, would you?"

Elisabeth looked at her as if she was crazy, "How would I know who lives here? I don't even know where I am." Then she looked at the other girl as if seeing her for the first time.

"Why are you wearing the clothes of a man?" she asked in bemusement.

Sam resisted the urge to roll her eyes, she hated when people called her on that. So what if she wasn't a man, she could kick ass with the best of them and had proved it by beating Turghan at his own game in her first year of being in SG1.

"On our planet women are equal to men, they fight just as well," she said with conviction. The she paused and said, "I mean you are from this planet, right?"

Elisabeth's eyes were huge, "Are you a mad-woman?" What did this woman mean? Was she insane? Was she dangerous?

Jack cut through their conversation, "Look, we've got more important things to worry about."

Elisabeth and Sam stopped talking and looked at Jack, he continued talking sarcastically, "Ya know, those big honkin'…..things."

Sam spoke up, "They're aliens," she looked at Elisabeth. "Have you seen these aliens before now?"

"Aliens? There is no such thing!" she exclaimed looking confused. "I have never seen these….these…_creatures _before in my life!"

They jumped as they heard banging at the door, the two soldiers moved towards the door while the brunette girl stayed behind them looking scared and clutching at her dress.

"We shouldn't open it, sir," warned Sam as her CO leaned against the door slightly and listened for any human sounds. He turned to her and she knew what he was going to say. "It could be a civilian, Carter."

"I know, but it could be an alien," she said cautiously.

Jack looked at her and nodded, "Carter, do you have _any _idea where we might be?" She blinked and shook her head.

"No sir, I don't even remember going through the Stargate," she answered confused. She looked around, "This planet looks very similar to Earth."

Jack gave her a look and said, "Ya think!"

The banging stopped and he looked back at the girls. He was about to say something when a hand crashed through the wooden door and almost grabbed his head, he hoisted his gun when the arm was pulled back through the door and he looked out the hole.

Jack put the gun through the newly-made hole and started firing at the aliens. He retracted the weapon and peeked outside, then he stepped back and wrenched the door open. He turned back to his 2IC and gestured through the door.

Sam nodded and then stopped, "Sir, I don't have a weapon." She was combat-trained but those aliens looked pretty strong and she'd rather be safe than sorry,

Jack grimaced, "There might be a gun in the house, if not get a knife." She nodded and started rummaging around in the draws and places that were likely to have guns in. She went into the lounge and opened a cupboard, Bingo! She pulled out a hand gun and checked that the safety was on before checking that the weapon was loaded, it was so she ran to the door and saw that her CO had already left his position.

She looked at Elisabeth, who was still in the house, and said, "Stay there." Then she walked out the door and was about to close it when she saw that the boy that her CO had changed into was running towards the house with another girl and-

What was that? Sam looked closer and saw that a big, furry alien was bounding towards them; she shook her head, Weird.

She opened the door wider letting them both back into the house and looked at the new girl oddly; she was dressed in a cat costume. What was going on?

The cat-girl looked freaked and turned to her, "Willow! What's going on?!"

Sam looked at her, "What did you call me?" Why did she call her that?

The girl looked at her strangely, "Look Willow, we'd all like to pretend that we don't know each other- me more than you, obviously- but now is not the time."

Sam looked bemused; she saw her CO smirk at her and barely stopped herself from rolling her eyes again, so she was confused, big deal. Okay so her being confused wasn't an everyday thing.

The girl had obviously decided to humor her, "Okay Willow, it's _Cordelia_, now can we stop playing the name game."

Sam looked at her CO with wide eyes, "Okay, this is very strange."

Cordelia looked at her scathingly, "No kidding, I was just attacked by JoJo- the dog-faced boy!" she glanced quickly at her costume looking indignant. "Look at my costume; do you really think that Party Town's going to give me my deposit back?"

The sleeves of her costume were ripped and shredded; something that the girl obviously wasn't too happy about.

While she was complaining Jack took his jacket off, then he put it over her shoulders; she looked at him surprised and said, "Thanks."

Sam spoke up, "Okay, you two should stay here; the Colonel and I will get help."

Cordelia looked at them confused, Colonel?

Jack nodded in agreement, and Elisabeth hurried to them and said, "Well, it's not our place to fight; surely some men will protect us."

Cordelia looked surprised and sarcastically said, "What's that riff?"

Sam started thinking, Elisabeth was obviously from somewhere in the 18th Century, Cordelia was obviously from their time; but they were on the same planet.

Sam Carter didn't get confused easily, but this was completely bewildering.

Sam needed to know some things. She looked at Cordelia who obviously knew her- sort of, "Why did you call me 'Willow'?"

Cordelia looked at her incredulously, "Uh, because that's your name!" she gave the redhead a pointed look.

Sam blinked, then the cat-girl looked at the teenage boy, "And your name isn't 'Colonel' it's Xander!"

Cordelia then looked at Elisabeth, "You are Buffy Summers, now for the last time can we finish the name-game!?"

Then the cat-girl looked around, "Did we just break into someone's house?" they nodded.

Cordelia looked exasperated, "You coulda just used Buffy's house, I don't think Mrs Summers is home."

"Where is this house?" asked Elisabeth looking more confused than ever.

"At the other end of the street," answered Cordelia, then she said, "We should go to Giles."

"Can he help us?" asked Jack who was confused but hid it well. He really didn't know what the hell was going on around here, he knew that he wasn't in his own body and that just freaked him out.

Cordelia nodded confidently.

Jack peeked out of the hole in the door and saw that none of the aliens were near them; he turned back to them, "Let's get moving."


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter four

Sam's instincts made her point her handgun at a particularly nasty-looking alien- no demon that ran passed them. Cordelia had explained along the way that the creatures that she and the Colonel thought were aliens were actually demons. Well, not really demons, they were apparently children that had turned into their Halloween costumes.

When the Colonel had asked what planet they were on the cat-girl had quite rudely said that they were on Earth but that he was probably from planet Mars because of the way he was acting.

The Colonel occasionally glared at the bratty teenager but didn't reply to that; there were a lot more important things to pay attention to.

They had broken into a run towards a large building that cat-girl said to be Sunnydale High; the former blonde wasn't used to feeling this tired so soon after running but she was out of breath by the time they all got to the entrance. The sooner she got back into her own body the better, she didn't feel as physically strong at she did in her body, she felt like a…well, like a 5"4 inch teenage girl with a slight build that obviously wasn't into a combat of any kind.

It could've been worse, at least she had possessed a teenager and not a pre-teen. If her luck was any worse she would have had to fight in the body of a ten year old, the thought almost made her shudder.

Unknown to any of them they had just avoided a confrontation with a platinum-blond vampire named Spike who was walking through the town looking gleefully surprised, "Well, this is just…" he paused reveling in the destruction. "_…neat_."

Cordelia lead the unlikely group through the halls of Sunnydale High, she hoped that there weren't any demons around. She ran faster as she spotted the doors to the Library, she snorted slightly; she had never though that she'd ever be glad to see that place.

They ran through the doors and into the library where they stopped to catch their breath, the cheerleader looked around hopefully and called, "Giles!?"

Giles looked at the group from his desk with a confused expression on his face, "What are you doing back here so early?" he asked curiously. Those kids were supposed to be looking after a group of young children.

Cordelia looked relieved, "Great, now we have Giles- he can figure out what's going on." A Police siren was heard from outside the building.

Meanwhile…

Angel strode through the small town looking for Buffy and the others, he looked around at the chaos feeling confused and also worried, he hoped that the gang was okay; suddenly he stopped dead.

He felt something familiar in the vicinity, something calling to him in only a vampire cou-

Spike was in Sunnydale, it certainly felt like him!

He ran faster, maybe they were in the High School… after all it was where Giles practically lived and they always looked to him for answers. Most likely they would be in the library.

Sam had researched and studied a lot of very odd things including aliens, but this was just too strange. She was trying to find information on what had happened to everyone including them. Possessed because of Halloween costumes, and she thought she'd heard and seen it all! The scientist in her was rebelling against what she had been told and also what she'd seen; there was no scientific explanation to what was going on. She hadn't been able to come up with one- not for lack of trying though.

"So everyone became what they were masquerading as?" asked Giles taking his glasses off.

"Yeah," replied Cordelia as the others researched. She paused looking a little uncertain. "Not everyone, I mean I haven't changed, thank god!"

She continued, "Willow and Xander were both soldiers and Buffy was an 18th Century girl."

Giles looked puzzled and put his glasses back on, "And you didn't change?"

Cordy shook her head, "No, I got my outfit from Party Town. The others got theirs from another shop…um, Ethan's, I didn't like any of the costumes he had."

Giles froze, that was a bad sign.

Whatever thoughts were on his mind were cut short as the library doors banged open, the two soldiers grabbed their guns and pointed them at the intruder, the new guy looked confused. He shook his head, "Oh good, you guys are alright- it's total chaos out there."

Jack and Sam just looked at him blankly but they both had a cautious looks on their faces, "Who are you?" they asked simultaneously.

"Okay, so…you wanna fill me in?" he asked looking confused. "What's going on here?"

He heard footsteps at turned to see Cordelia walking towards them, she said, "They don't know who they are, everyone's turned into a monster- it's a whole big thing!" she smiled sweetly at the vampire. "How are you?"

He didn't say anything; this was confusing.

Then Giles walked up to him after telling the two soldiers to lower their weapons, "It appears that the people who bought their costumes from a new shop…_Ethan's_…" he spat the name out as if it were poison. "…has turned into their outfits, while the people that wore the costumes that weren't bought from that place remain themselves."

Sam in Willow's body walked up to the librarian with a determined look on her face, "So, we get Ethan and get him to reverse whatever he's done." Then she looked worried. "Reversing this is possible…right?"

Giles looked slightly menacing, "It had better be." Ethan was going to pay for this.

Jack walked to them looking restless, he hated books and research. That was Daniel's thing not his. "So, we beat this guy up and force him to get us back to normal- sounds like a plan." He bounced on the balls of his feet eagerly.

Giles considered this, "Well, we can't all go." He looked at them. "Xand- Jack should stay with Angel and Elisabeth (Jack scowled slightly) and Wil- Sam and Cordelia should come with me- Cordelia knows where this shop is and we might need Sam."

Jack looked sulky, "Swell," he muttered sarcastically. The he spoke louder, "Who's this guy?" he pointed to the vampire. "If we're working together shouldn't we at least know his name?"

Jack had interrupted them a few times with his cynical, snarky and sarcastic comments and it had started to grate on Giles's nerves- still, he was the voice of reason and he would remain calm…even if it killed him.

"Angel," stated the dark-haired vampire. Jack raised his eyebrows, Angel? What kinda name is that for a guy?

Giles grimaced slightly, "Well, now that that's over with you two and Elisabeth should…"

He trailed off as he looked around the library which was now missing a person, he turned to the others, "Where has Buff- Elisabeth gone?"

Silence filled the room for a few moments and then Angel said, "Xan- Jack and I will look for her." Giles nodded looking worried.

"Yes, and Sam, Cordelia and I will find a way to stop whatever it is that Ethan has done," he said, there was a touch of coldness in his voice that matched his eyes.

A little later Angel and Jack were scouring the streets for Buffy- who was now Elisabeth. They marched along the road through town, "You sure she came this way?" asked Jack.

"No," replied Angel sounding restless and worried. Then he stopped dead; if he were human he would have blanched. "A now Spike's here."

Oh god! He'd completely forgotten to tell the others about Spike's arrival in Sunnydale, how the hell could he have forgotten?

Jack looked at the vampire- yeah, vampire. Who would have guessed that he'd be in the company of a goddamn vampire!? Just lucky he was informed or there would have a huge misunderstanding between the two of them.

"Who's Spike?" he asked smirking slightly. What kinda name was 'Spike' anyway? Angel shot him an annoyed look before answering.

"He's a one-hundred and forty-five year old vampire," he turned to the soldier and warned seriously. "You really don't want to know why he's named 'Spike' trust me."

Jack paused and then said, "Spike knows Buffy, right?"

"Yeah, he wants to add her on to his list of the Slayers that he's killed," Angel explained looking around for her. "He hasn't been able to kill her yet but whoever she is now she's helpless, come on!"

They both broke into a run hoping to find the Slayer soon.

The platinum-blond vampire moved away slightly from his position behind a tree, he had heard the conversation and was gleeful. The Slayer was helpless and a walking target- killing her should be as easy as taking candy from a baby- which he had already done, it was Halloween night after all.

He turned back to a couple of demon-kids one of which was red-faced and had horns on his head, "Do you here that my friends?"

They growled appreciatively as Spike grinned.

"Somewhere out here is the tenderest meat you've ever tasted and all we have to do…is find her first."

Meanwhile…

Elisabeth's heart pounded in her chest as she ran through an alleyway, she almost wished that she hadn't left those people, but they were- well, insane! Demons! Vampires! _Aliens!_ Planets! They were mad, utterly mad! They had to be dangerous.

But as Elisabeth looked around the alley she thought that maybe it would have been just a little bit safer with the mad people than out here where she was currently frozen…looking at a man with a screwed up face, yellow eyes and raggedy-looking clothes, a red hat and an eye patch over one of his eyes.

Maybe she should have just stayed with those weird people.

The thing leered at her and stepped forwards, "Pretty, pretty."

Elisabeth turned immediately and ran; he followed her slowly- savoring her terror and the way her emotions smelled. Prey tasted better when they were scared, it made their blood boil and rush in a hot red stream…

The vampire licked his fangs and picked up his pace, she would taste great…

Giles, Sam and Cordy opened the door to Ethan's shop slowly and entered in the same manner, Giles shut the door quietly and then they looked around curiously, they passed racks of costumes, most likely enchanted costumes; they passed a few models and a sign.

"Hello!" called Giles abruptly. "Anyone home?"

He glanced at the redheaded teenager behind him who was looking around; she passed him and he followed her through some green curtains. A statue of a head with glowing green eyes sat on a stool, he looked at it. "Janus, Roman mythical god."

He noted vaguely that Cordelia was looking at the costumes near to where they came in.

"What does this mean?" asked Sam while thinking of how disappointed Daniel would be to miss out on seeing an actual statue of Janus.

What on earth was Ethan thinking? He answered Sam's question, "Primarily the division of self, male and female- light and dark."

"Chunky and creamy!" the two of them jumped as a grey-haired man sauntered. Then he waved his hands around mockingly, "Oh! Sorry, that's peanut-butter!"

Giles just stared at the man with an unreadable look on his face, "Willow- um Sam, get out of here now."

Sam grasped her gun tighter, "But…"

"Now!" he said firmly as he looked at the smiling man. Sam glared at him slightly.

"You might need backup," she argued. Giles closed his eyes briefly in irritation.

Giles then reminded her that if she got hurt it wouldn't be her that suffered the consequences it would be the girl she was inhabiting, her resolve weakened slightly and she decided that she should get Cordelia and make sure that the cat-girl didn't come into the room.

Giles was right; she had no right to endanger a teenage girl- even if the said girl wasn't in her own body.

"Hello Ethan," he uttered in a low voice, his expression colder.

"Hello Ripper," he greeted sounding cheerful.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter five.

Elisabeth backed away open-mouthed with mounting panic as she faced the vampire with an eye-patch, she turned and started to run again but tripped over the boxes and junk littering the alleyway, her heart jumped into her throat as she smelt the putrid breath of the monster and struggled weakly when the vampire grabbed her .

She whimpered in terror as the oddly-dressed vampire turned her around to face him, he was leering hungrily and he started lowering his head to her neck slowly savoring the smell of terror and the tears on her face. A battle cry disrupted the still, slightly muggy, air and the vampire was torn away from her violently.

She saw the dark-haired man tackle the vampire to the ground; the man got up from the ground and pulled the monster up with him; he slammed her attacker against the wall and started punching him. The vampire gained the upper hand for a moment and pushed the man into the other wall opposite the one that he was pushed up against; the vampire punched the man in the stomach harshly.

Elisabeth watched fearfully and felt a flicker of hope as the man twisted the monster's left arm behind his back painfully and kneed him in the stomach. Sweat trickled down her back. She heard footsteps; turned and saw that 'Angel' guy running towards her.

She heard the fight between the man and the monster going on behind her as she watched Angel run up to her and then stop, "Buffy, are you okay?" he asked sounding concerned.

Elisabeth just looked at him, she heard a loud pain filled grunt and the sound of a person being slammed up against a hard wall; Angel ran passed her and she saw that the vampire had started to gain the advantage over the man-with-the-Musket.

He pulled the monster off the other guy and started punching him, they grappled for a moment. Angel gave a growl of frustration and as the monster flipped the man to the ground sloppily she was horrified to see that the man's face had screwed up- just like the demon that had attacked her.

She uttered a little scream and stepped backwards; she tripped over an obstacle. The other dark-haired man, who hopefully wasn't a demon, tackled the oddly-dressed demon and pulled him off the other.

The man kept punching and kicking him until the vampire was pushed into a garbage heap before he was showered by cardboard boxes, he didn't get back up again either because he was unconscious or because he was too scared to.

Angel and Jack stood together staring at the assailant for a few moments then Jack said, "It's strange but beating up that pirate gave me a weird sense of closure."

They both heard noises behind them and turned to see Elisabeth starting to run away from them again; the human of the two men moved fast and grabbed the girl before she was able to get herself into even more danger. She struggled and he muttered, "Crying out loud!"

"Look kid we're just trying to help," said Jack sounding pissed off.

Elisabeth stopped and said, "You help a demon!" she pointed towards Angel. "He's a vampire!"

Jack grimaced, "He's not gonna hurt us!" she looked at him.

"How do I know?" she asked in a small voice. Jack softened up slightly.

"Because if he was trying to hurt us he would've let you be killed and he would have tried to hurt me by now- but he hasn't."

Jack never thought in his entire life that he would ever say this but, "He's a good vampire."

She looked up at him tearfully, "Really?" Jack nodded hoping that she'd believe him.

They all turned and saw Sam and Cordelia running towards them, the redhead had a bloody lip and a red patch on her cheek, "Colonel! We've got to get inside!"

Cordelia agreed vigorously, "Will- Sam tried to fight them off but I had to pull her out of there. There were SO many of them!" They all heard the footsteps coming towards them and saw a gang of vampires, demons and a certain platinum blond vampire leading them.

Sam was a bit pale, she was fine with fighting even if the opponent was tougher than her but if she died so would the child that she was in; she was going to kill whoever was doing this! She and the girl were just lucky that Cordelia had managed to get to distract them all long enough for her to get out of the place she had been cornered into.

"This way, find an open warehouse!" said Angel pointed behind them. He ran to Elisabeth and picked her up.

"We're on the move!" ordered Jack grabbing his firearm from the ground; they all ran as far as they could away from the gang of demons.

Meanwhile…

Ethan, still smirking, said, "What?" He smirked wider at the cold look on his former friend's face. "No hug?"

The warlock paced around looking a little gleeful and then he looked at the other man and said mockingly "Are you pleased to see your old mate, Rupert?"

He turned away again and started to examine a costume, behind him Giles walked towards him, "I am rather surprised, I could guess it was you."

"This Halloween stunt stinks of Ethan Rayne," Giles said looking around the room. Ethan looked up without a hint of remorse on his sinisterly-handsome face and smirked.

"Yes it does, doesn't it?" he replied sounding and looking very proud of himself. "I don't want to blow my own trumpet but its ingenious; the very embodiment of 'be careful what you wish for'"

"It's sick, brutal and it harms the innocent," said Giles with cold conviction in his voice. Ethan snorted.

"Oh and we all know that you're the champion of all things pure and good, Rupert," he said sarcastically. He turned to Giles, "It's quite a little act you've got going here old man."

"It's not an act," stated Giles. "It's who I am."

"Who you are?" questioned Ethan sardonically. "A Watcher, sniveling tweed-clad guardian of the Slayer and her friends, I think not. I know who you are Rupert and I know what you're capable of."

He grinned and continued, "But they don't, do they, they have no idea where you come from."

Giles took a menacing move towards him and said, "Break the spell Ethan and leave this place and never come back."

"Why should I? What's in the bargain for me?" asked Ethan slyly.

"You get to live," he stated flatly. Ethan gave him a mocking look.

"Oh Rupert, you're scaring m-" His words were cut short as Giles punched him in the stomach and kneed him in the face.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter six

Angel, Cordelia, Jack and Sam ran towards the warehouse in front of them, Elisabeth looked over the good-vampire's shoulder to check how close the group of demons was to catching them. They were several feet away from them.

Jack slid the door open and let the rest of the group through the entrance; Angel set the girl down next to Cordelia.

"Check if there are any other ways in!" Jack ordered, the redheaded girl nodded. Angel told Elisabeth to stay where she was.

Jack had already closed the door by the time the demons had started banging on it. He started barricading the doors against the group of demons, his 2IC helped by whacking a metal pole on the head of a demon that had managed to open the door and stick its head through to growl at them.

It hissed in agony and the redhead swung it at the demon's head again; the thing withdrew its head.

Cordelia was irritated and commented on Elisabeth's clingy habit as the girl grasped her arm looking frightened; the door to the warehouse had already opened and an ugly demon with horns screeched angrily as Jack shoved a metal cage door in its face, the man struggled as the demon tried to push its way into the warehouse.

"GO!" yelled Jack to the others.

They ran but Sam helped him struggle against the demons, after one particularly violent and strong push from the demons the two soldiers decided to make a break for it; the demons knocked the objects barricading the door away and Spike walked in calmly with his game-face on. They followed the group of White-hats with malicious grins on their grotesque faces.

"And you said that Ripper was long gone," Ethan said and his tone gave away how much physical pain he was in. He was lying on the ground with blood flowing from his nose.

Giles was wiping his hands on his handkerchief, "Tell me how to stop the spell," said Giles frostily. More Police sirens were heard outside.

Ethan smirked sardonically, "Say 'pretty please'."

A familiar dark rage filled the librarian and he kicked his former friend in the stomach hard, the warlock yelled out in pain.

Elisabeth back away fearfully, tears streamed down her cheeks, she looked at the thing that had terrified her; a platinum-blond vampire.

"Look at you," taunted Spike. "Terrified, alone, lost little lamb."

The others were struggling as the demons restrained them and stopped them from helping her. Spike backhanded her across the face, "I love it!" he said gleefully.

"Buffy!" yelled Angel as he tried to wrench himself out of the demon's grip unsuccessfully. He saw Spike grasp her neck.

Spike licked his lips hungrily; he could smell the absolute terror, he pushed her against a crate and lowered his head to her neck slowly.

Giles kicked Ethan again; the man lying on the ground yelled out in pain again, he then chuckled. The watcher looked unconcerned and said, "Tell me how to break the spell."

Ethan looked at him and smirked, "Janus, break the statue."

Giles quickly grabbed the statue of Janus, lifted it up and threw it as hard as he could onto the ground.

It smashed.

The demons holding the White-hats let go, Cordelia turned and saw that the demons were gone and in their place stood a group of scared and confused-looking children. "Where's my mommy!?" one of them wailed.

Jack grabbed his gun to whack the pale-haired vampire over the head with but then everything went black.

Xander Harris was now holding a toy gun and looking very confused, he saw that a vampire was about to bite Buffy so he started to run forwards but then saw that the blond guy was looking stunned and holding a dark wig.

Buffy grinned wickedly and said, "Hi honey, I'm home!" Then she launched herself at him and threw him into some barrels. He crashed into them and barely managed to stay upright.

"You know what?" she said as she whacked him over the head with a metal pole. "It's good to be me!"

Giles turned and looked mildly surprised by the fact that Ethan had disappeared.

Spike jumped up and ran off while he had the chance.

The Slayer turned to her friends and smiled at them, they walked towards her.

"Hey Buff," said Xander. "Welcome back."

"You too," said Buffy. Cordelia looked at them surprised,

"You guys remember what happened?" she asked.

Xander swallowed, "It was way creepy, it was like I was there but I couldn't get out."

Cordelia grimaced, "Yeah, I know the feeling, this outfit's totally skin-stiff…"

Angel and Buffy looked at each other, "Are you okay?" he asked. The blonde smiled at him.

"Yeah."

Angel put an arm around her and led her away leaving Cordelia and Xander staring after them.

Cordelia sniffed indignantly, "Hello, if felt like I was talking, my lips were moving and-"

"Give it up, Cordy," interrupted the soldier-boy. "You're never going to get between those two- believe me I know."

She turned to the befuddled children, "Well, I guess you'd better get them back to their parents."

Xander nodded, he wondered how much the children were going to remember after tonight. Not much, obviously. "Yeah, everybody seems to-" he was confused and looked around. "Where's Wil-"

But Willow was crouched on the ground feeling disorientated, her head was spinning and her entire body was burning mildly; then the unusual feeling stopped. "Woah, head-rush," she muttered then her head cleared, she stood up and walked over to her childhood best friend and childhood nemesis. She wiped at her lip and hissed in pain; her cheek felt bruised and probably was. She glanced at her hand and saw that it had blood on it from where she had touched her stinging lip.

She dismissed it; it wasn't like she hadn't had worse.

Xander yelped slightly as Willow slapped his arm, she glared at him but there was a bit of a smile in her eyes. "You jinxed us!" she accused only half serious.

"How's that?" asked Xander, confused.

"You questioned the weirdness of the lack of demons and vampires on Halloween… then they crawled right out of their hiding places and started to make with the badness!" she waggled her right index finger at her.

Giles walked into Ethan's shop the next day with caution but saw that the shop had been emptied. He looked around and eventually found a card on a table; it had writing on it, he read. 'Be seeing you,' it was in Ethan's handwriting.

He knew that Ethan would be back.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter seven

The cool night air brushed her face as she looked up at the sky; she sighed and tucked a strand of red hair behind her ear restlessly. She did this a lot, just sat on the windowsill and stared upwards for hours on end; of course, since she'd found out what went bump in the night the activity had become less popular to her.

The redheaded teenager jumped suddenly as she heard a car door slam breaking the silence for a moment, she looked down and saw a cat padding across the sidewalk; she brought her jean-clad knees to her chest and hugged them as she resumed her staring.

When she'd looked up at the sky a month ago she'd seen- well, just a sky that was so polluted no stars were ever seen, but now; she saw something completely different. She saw another threat to the world, another fight, another war; the scariest thing was that she knew there was a huge fight going on beyond everyone's sight but she couldn't DO anything about it- she couldn't help fight it and she didn't know when the world was going to end next. She knew that saving the world against the supernatural meant nothing if the Goa'uld landed on Earth and started an invasion or a meteorite ended up smashing them all to Hell.

She was half glad that she wasn't alone in her worrying, glad that she wasn't the only one who knew how much shit they were all in; she wasn't the only one that had gotten the extremely-unwanted memories from Halloween night.

"Will?" she turned and saw her best friend of thirteen years looking back at her with slightly darkened eyes, she swallowed the lump that came into her throat; the dark-haired buddy had gotten the worst of the memories, if you didn't consider Jolinar. He had told her that he remembered the life of the soldier that he'd been possessed by, a soldier called Jack O'Neill, leader of SG1, the cynical, sarcastic, stubborn guy who'd lost a lot of loved ones.

"Still can't sleep, Xan?" she asked him already knowing the answer. They'd gotten closer in the last month after what had happened; they talked a lot and knew what the other was going through. The memories of two Black Ops soldiers, soldiers that had killed people, granted not in cold blood, but nonetheless had slaughtered human beings; they remembered their loved ones dying.

Her mom- no, SAM'S mom not hers; she remembered the look on her- Sam's- dad's face just before he said the words that broke her- Sam's- heart into a millions little pieces, the words that told her she'd never speak or laugh with her- Sam's- mom ever again.

Xander remembered Jack's worst memory; the sound of a gun going off, the sounds of Sara's screaming, the dread and pain restricting his breathing and tearing at his heart, the sight of his son- no Jack's son lying on his side as still as a statue, blood streaming down his pale- almost lifeless face. The gun still in his small limp hand; he remembered yelling at Sara to call an ambulance, remembered turning back to his boy and trying carefully to stop the flow of blood.

And that's when Xander had to try as hard as he could to stop the memories, to push them away and the emotions away with it.

"Xander?" the teenager jumped and blinked back tears, dammit! He'd remembered again, it was bad enough that his dreams wouldn't let him forget; now he remembered them when he was awake. And he'd just zoned out, swell.

"Sorry, Willow," he muttered looking at her concerned face. She gave him a knowing look, he could never hide anything from her- especially now. They needed each other; they understood what the other was going through because they were going through it themselves. They hadn't wanted to tell the others, there was no point. All it would do would burden them with the knowledge that what they were doing to keep their world safe may not be enough. Then there was the other horrifying thought of the demon community finding out about the SGC, would the demons attack the complex? It was best not to think about it, it was best for everyone if they kept that information to themselves.

Hence, the closeness.

Willow smiled at him, "S'okay, Xand," she turned back to the sky and looked up thoughtfully. "I wonder what they're doing now."

Maybe SG1 was saving the world or another Planet that wasn't in their known Universe, maybe they were now stepping through the Stargate back home to Earth after exploring either a Goa'uld-infested world, or a world inhabited by Earth-descendants or beings without any human physiology at all.

Willow wished she knew, they both did.

Jack O'Neill jerked awake and looked around his bedroom feeling disoriented, he was breathing hard and tried to make the echoes of his bad dream go away, he sighed and ripped the covers off him before throwing his legs over the side of his bed. He stood up and paced around the room for a few minutes, he knew that he wouldn't sleep after that dream; neither his thoughts nor his dreams let him rest.

He hadn't gotten a decent night's sleep since the Replicators' attempted invasion, but it wasn't because of the bugs or that they had almost been killed.

No, he couldn't sleep because he couldn't stop thinking about those children, the little redheaded Carter Junior and the goofy boy who made jokes, the same kids who were fighting those, um…demons. Christ, if Hammond could read his mind at the moment he knew that he would be sent to Dr. MacKenzie to have his head examined! Then the inevitable white padded cell with the side-order of straitjacket.

Sweet.

He could hardly believe what his mind and memories were telling him; he had the memories of a dark-haired boy with crappy parents who met a sweet little redheaded girl who was four years old in the first day of Kindergarten; the girl that was deep and caring despite the cold, neglective and distant parents that she was burdened with. He could remember playing with the same girl in first grade in the playground, he could remember pushing down a pretty but cold little brunette child called Cordelia after she shoved the boy's friend to the ground.

He remembered the boy's angry drunken father yelling at him after he accidentally smashed a plate, he was seven at the time and had ran out of the house to Wil…Willow's house to get away from him. He remembered the feeling of safety...well, the boy's safety of sleeping over at Willow's house and not having to worry about his parent's yelling and the fights they had with each other.

But where did those memories come from? That was what he'd asked himself after he woke up with the memories a month earlier, he had been asleep as normal dreaming of Teal'c asking him for dance lessons and of Daniel coming out of the bathroom complaining about the Tok'ra's lack of ability in Baseball, then the dream had changed completely into…well, he wasn't sure if he was dreaming or not but he'd been surrounded by demons and people that he didn't know. Then there was the whole fiasco of some guy called Giles and another guy called Ethan and then there was the vampire guy who looked like a Billy Idol wannabe.

After he'd remembered that Carter had been in the dream he'd gone to her as soon as he could and asked her, of course just in case he was the only one in on it he had been vague but the blonde had caught on almost immediately.

Carter, he had discovered, had been working on a project - big surprise there – and had fallen asleep for no reason. She had been sitting at her desk, in her lab, wide awake and eagerly looking over some of her notes when everything had gone black. That was when she'd seen those creepy demon dudes running around before she'd caught up with him. Carter had told him what happened and they came to the obvious conclusion that they'd been in the same dream…if it was a dream.

After the dream had ended she had had her head in her arms which were on the desk; she just looked to anyone else as if she had just woken up from a weird dream after working too hard.

They had gone over to his place the next day and had talked about what happened and what they remembered, she of course had been skeptical of what had just happened and had thought that they both might have been infected with a virus, it wouldn't have been the first time. She had suggested going to see Janet and getting checked over just in case.

Jack had grudgingly agreed but only because they wouldn't divulge any information about the reason of their concerns. The results were clear; they were not infected by anything as far as the doc could say. But Jack had already known that they weren't infected by anything, they went back to Sam's lab afterwards and had talked for a long time.

They knew about another threat to the planet, a threat that was being fought by children in a small, seemingly peaceful town of Sunnydale which was situated in California. Sam had grabbed a laptop and looked at any information on Sunnydale, while she was doing that he had thought about telling Daniel and Teal'c about what happened.

After a little thinking he had decided to tell them, then he'd thought of telling Hammond; but he had backed away from that idea. It wasn't that he couldn't trust the guy because he knew he could but he wanted to keep it quiet for a while until they all got their heads around the information.

He'd tell Hammond eventually, he doubted that the General would call the President though, but he couldn't be sure. He didn't want Kinsey and his NID goons going after the kids; he didn't want them messing around in the supernatural business either. The military and supernatural were a bad mix, but the military, supernatural, politicians AND the NID would be…well, the shit would keep hitting the fan for eternity and beyond.

Carter had found a lot of information on Sunnydale, a lot of very odd information. Wild dogs eating the High school Principle, the constant disappearances of the Sunnydale population, the massacres of several students in late 1997; the dead kids were found by Willow Rosenberg and Cordelia Chase. Then there was the fact that the town had the most Cemeteries in it, the town was tiny but it had more Cemeteries in it than other places that were ten times bigger and more populated.

There was definitely something strange going on in that town- and they knew what it was.

Jack looked at his door silently and then walked to it and walked out of his bedroom and down the stairs, he walked through the lounge and then into the kitchen; he went to the sink after rubbing the sleep from his eyes and then grabbed a glass and filled it with water from the tap. After gulping down the contents of the glass he leant against the counter and wondered what those kids were doing.

He growled, those kids shouldn't have to risk their lives like that, not like…soldiers. Why did the kids choose to fight? They should be worrying about their school grades and dating not when the world was going to end for crying out loud!

Jack wondered, not for the first time, if the memories went both ways. Would the kids have their memories? God, he hoped not. He wouldn't wish his memories on anyone- well, maybe the Goa'uld or Kinsey.

A sick feeling grew in him, the redheaded girl had Carter's memories; if she had the blonde's memories than that meant that she had the memories of Jolinar and the Goa'uld. Carter hadn't been able to handle a lot of the memories, how would a teenage girl handle them?

He put his glass on the counter and rubbed his face with his hands, he could feel a headache coming right behind his eyes, he had a bad feeling and it wasn't the headache.

He had a feeling that this would all blow up in their faces. The kids' included.


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter eight

Xander walked out of the classroom grinning slightly, the science teacher was left feeling stunned and confused as he watched the boy exit the room with a jump in his step.

Xander Harris was known for his rather bad grades and class work, he was known for being the class clown, but today he had been- well, concentrating this time. Maybe all these years of being a friend to Willow Rosenberg had influenced him to study harder, either that or Hell had just frozen over, he had been one of the first students to finish the Physics test first; but, just because he'd finished fast didn't mean the results would be any better than usual.

Curiosity made the teacher pick up the boy's paper, he flicked through it so as not to make his interest known to the rest of the class; unable to check that the answers were right just by skimming the sheets he just put it back on the pile and impatiently waited for the rest to finish.

The dark-haired adolescent ran up to Willow quickly poked her sides with both of his index fingers making her jump, she grinned as she realized that it was him and not an insane person, "Hey Will," he said cheerfully.

Willow gave him a smirk, "What's the matter Xand, did Cafeteria bring in real food this time?" Xander shook his head and looked positively overflowing with mischief.

"Nope, better actually," he replied. "I'm pretty sure I just shocked Mr. Strong into a temporary mute state." He bobbed up and down slightly making the redhead beside him grin. "That test was- it was EASY!" he exclaimed.

Xander had never passed a test with full marks in his life; he had only just finished the test but he was sure that he had just passed it with flying colours; he hated the memories that were in him but despite the bad and horrifying parts a little good did come out of it. "I knew the answers, Will- I got most if not all of them right!"

Willow smiled at her best friend feeling happy for him, "That's brilliant, Xan." Then she grinned eagerly, "Hey, we can go to the Science club together!"

Xander pulled a face that said, 'You're joking!' and then said, "Just 'cause I know stuff doesn't mean I wanna listen to techno-babble, Cart- Willow."

Willow looked disappointed and then confused, "Why did you say 'Cart' before saying my name?"

Xander, who had been looking quite confused, said, "I don't know, it just slipped out."

Willow's eyes widened in shock, "You were going to call me 'Carter' weren't you!" She hoped that they weren't turning back into the people that possessed them.

"Oh god, we're turning into those soldier guys, we're- we're gonna…like, start saluting…a-and stuff!" Willow babbled as she panicked. "This is bad-

Xander grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her slightly to snap her out of it, "Will! We're not turning into our costumes!" They couldn't be turning into them and it wasn't just wishful thinking, Buffy was still slaying demons and talking about them too, she wasn't changing into that Princess. It would be blindingly obvious if she were.

Willow breathed in and out trying to compose herself, "We'r- we're not?" She hoped they weren't, she liked being her- well, not all the time 'cause of being picked on, but other than that she didn't want to change.

"Because, if we were then Buffy would be as well, and she's still talking about vampire and demons," Willow looked a lot calmer now. "Plus, if we were turning into our costumes the little kids would be running around looking like demons."

Willow nodded, "Oh, oh yeah," she smiled looking relieved. "But, what's with the name changes?"

Xander sighed and said, "I think that we may be turning into them…just a little bit, ya know, 'cause of the memories." He gestured at his hair pointedly and continued. "And do you really think that I'd get the sense to change my hair style if I were just your average Xander Harris?" there was a note of sarcasm in his voice.

Willow looked at his hair, "Definitely not."

"Thank you," he said triumphantly. Then said, "Hey!"

Xander had had the strongest desire to do something with his shaggy, messy hair which for some reason had started annoying him greatly since he was possessed by that soldier guy…O'Neill. So, despite the very good chance that his parents would yell at him for hours, he got his hair shortened a lot. He'd get yelled at more when he got home but was worth it- besides the yelling usually happened even when he'd done nothing wrong, so he might as well give them a reason to yell.

Xander then gave her a smug look, "Hey, I'm not the only one here who's finally seen the light, you got you hair cut too." Although he wasn't complaining, the short hair suited her and, according to Willow, her hair didn't fly into her face when she was fighting demons anymore.

Willow looked conceding, "Point taken," she said and absentmindedly tucked her much-shorter hair behind her ears. The Cordettes of course had criticized it just like she'd expected them to; she didn't care though, she had a lot more important things to worry about and dwell on. Like her nightmares and the visions she'd been getting of people with parasitical snake aliens in their heads, it was a small relief that the said aliens were nicer than the bad kind. She remembered some guy named Martouf and a snake- a nice snake- called Lantesh.

She tried to forget about the memories, visions and the soldier-possession but it was kinda hard to, especially when a vampire had managed to drink some of her blood the second time she and Xander gone to fight vampires without Buffy. The vampire had gone ballistic and had been even harder to kill after that but somehow they'd managed.

That night they had been closer to death than ever, it had left them shaken but strangely enough made them more determination to fight better, they knew how to fight because of the memories of the training they'd both had in the Military but unlike their minds their bodies didn't have the training and were rather weak compared to the soldiers'.

So, the only solution was to ask Giles to help them train like he did with Buffy. Unfortunately, Giles wasn't exactly young and the Slayer's training left him with more injuries than he cared to admit. So, they decided, after thinking about it together, to look for a local Gym.

After only an hour Willow had found the kind of gym that they were both looking for on her Laptop.

Her parents would of course never notice if she went to the gym, they wouldn't notice the money depleting slightly either, unfortunately Xander's parents might notice if their son didn't come home. Not right away but they'd figure it out eventually, the Harris's also didn't have a lot of money, probably because of the amount wasted on Cigarettes and Alcohol, and wouldn't be able to pay for the Gym lessons.

Maybe she would pay for Xander's as well, her parents wouldn't notice at all and not for lack of paying attention to the bank details but because they threw money at her as if throwing pebbles into water. They'd rather give her money than pay any attention to her, obviously they thought money was more important than staying with her for more than a month. Which they rarely ever did.

Her thoughts strayed back to the night they had found out that Willow had something strange in her blood.

They still had the cuts, gashes, scrapes and bruises to remind them of the night, she was beginning to realize why the vampire had acted the way it did, she had flashes in her dreams of not being able to stop her own body and watching helplessly as faceless people tried unsuccessfully to stop her as she rampaged through some place that was familiar to her.

She was pretty sure she had something running through her blood, but she wasn't certain what it was or what it meant. Honesty, she didn't want to know; she already had too much to deal with.

A hand snapped her out of her deep thoughts, she looked up surprised and saw that Xander was waving a hand in front of her face, "Heellllooo!" she pushed his hand away, smiling slightly. "What's on your mind?"

Willow gave him a sarcastic look, "What do you think?"

"Visions, dreams and a whole lotta shit," he stated seriously. He had them too, well, not the visions just the nightmares and they were quite enough to be dealing with. "Look, I think the best thing we can do about that right now is try to forget- it's the only thing we can do."

"Believe me, I'm trying to forget them," said Willow looking pained. "It's not working all that well."

Xander understood more than anyone else ever could, except those two soldiers, even with the lack of parasitical memories going over thousands of years. He hugged his best friend and wished that he could find that Rayne guy.

He'd love to have a little chat with the son of a bitch, face to face.

Meanwhile in Colorado Springs

Sam was scared and also confused as she sat cross-legged on the floor of her bedroom with her head down looking at the front cover of a book she'd never thought she'd buy. Ever.

"What am I thinking?" she muttered to herself. "I'm insane- that's it. I'm insane."

How could she- it was against everything she'd ever said and believed in. What she was looking at totally disregarded the law of physics. It was impossible…more than impossible.

So, why then, was she sitting and staring at the front cover that had, "The Basics of Magic and Witchcraft" on it?


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter nine

Jack O'Neill grimaced and rubbed his temples, "Daniel, shut up," he said irritably. His headache pulsed painfully behind his eyes as he tried to ward it off, the archaeologist's ramblings wasn't exactly helping much.

"But Jack," complained Daniel. "I don't think you understand the-

Jack rolled his eyes impatiently, "Oh, for cryin' out loud. Daniel, I don't care about the damn historical whatsamacallit!" if Daniel didn't quit lecturing him about the history and cultural crap he was gonna tape his mouth shut.

"But-" started Daniel.

"One more word about cultural stuff and I'll tape your mouth," Jack interrupted as his head throbbed painfully. He saw the archaeologist give up and sighed in relief, sometimes that guy didn't stop 'till you told him to.

Jack knew that there were a lot more important stuff to talk about and it didn't involve the question of who built the pyramids of Egypt, he knew that Daniel knew that too but sometimes he needed to be reminded, "Okay, we need to come up with some ideas of how to help those kids back in Sunnydale, I vote we go down there and beat the crap out of those demons and vampires."

Teal'c nodded, "I agree, O'Neill. But I suggest using more caution as we cannot help these children if we are dead."

Straight to the point, that's one of things that Jack liked about T, "Okay, so we've decided on going to Sunnyhell." Good thing, he hated waiting around while those kids fought a war that even the SGC didn't know existed.

"But, sir," started Sam. "What about the General?" Hammond would know that something was going on if they failed to show up when they were called in.

Jack thought for a moment, "SG1's way overdue for some downtime." They could probably get a week or two in, then they'd go and help the kids.

Sam nodded, normally she'd say no to the time off work but they needed to help the kids.

Jack nodded to himself, thinking, "We'll get the plane tickets on Tuesday, we pack then we go to Sunnyhell, simple."

Teal'c inclined his head slightly in agreement.

Sam nodded, it was a good idea, they could help the kids without having to worry about getting into trouble with the General; then the Scooby Gang wouldn't be in any danger of being found out by the military.

Perfect.

Teal'c frowned deeper than usual and looked at the Colonel, "O'Neill, if we are to fight the demons and vampires how then are we able to fight the Goa'uld?" Was he going to give up the fight to free his people? To free his family? But then O'Neill only said that they were to be staying there for up to two weeks, so they could assist the young warriors in their fight against evil for two we-

"Also, what is the point of helping to fight the supernatural if it is that we are only there for two weeks?" he continued solemnly. "How will our being there for such a short amount of time help?"

Jack clenched his jaw to stop himself gaping at Teal'c's words- at Teal'c's MANY words, he shook himself mentally and tried to find the answers to the questions that Teal'c asked. The big guy was right, how could they really help those kids if they were only there for two weeks?

Well they had to do something, for cryin' out loud. He couldn't just ignore the fact that a small group of teenagers were risking their lives every other night for a world where most people were completely ignorant of what was going on around them.

Although, maybe it was a good thing that most people were ignorant of the supernatural…people like Kinsey would have a field-day if they found out that aliens weren't the only source of power for them to control, especially if the guy found himself a witch or a Slayer to experiment on-

Jack repressed a shudder as he realized how Kinsey and his goons would react to all this; there would be a witch-hunt.

"Sir?" asked Sam and he realized that he'd been quiet for too long.

"What about the NID and Kinsey?" he asked flatly. "We can't let them find out about the supernatural, they'd turn those kids into lab-rats." The frustration was not helping his headache which seemed to be getting worse. He pushed the pain from his mind so that he could concentrate.

Sam agreed, this was starting to be a lot more complicated that she had first thought. They had to find a way to help Willow, Xander and the others. "But what if the NID follow us to Sunnydale, we could inadvertently put the group in danger by leading Kinsey to their doorstep."

She looked at her CO, "We don't have the right to put the kids in danger like this, they haven't even asked for our help- what if they don't need it?"

Sam backtracked, of course they needed help, they were just kids and they were fighting a war, "No, they need help, they definitely need help."

Jack winced as his headache worsened, "Ya think?"

"Colonel, I really don't think we have the right to put them in danger like this," she repeated. "We're interfering in a war that barely know, and we know what happened the last time we did just that."

How could they forget? He felt the usual guilty twinge inside him as he remembered those people that he'd shot using the Eurondan Piloting Unit. He hadn't known the full facts about the war and he'd ended up killing the good guys instead of the bad. They had visited Euronda more than a week ago and since then Sam had been acting strangely around him, probably still unsure what to make of his decision to order the Iris of the Stargate closed when knowing full well that that murdering little scumbag hadn't heeded his warning about NOT following them through the 'gate.

"I believe that Major Carter is indeed correct," stated Teal'c flatly. "We should proceed with extreme caution and vigilance." He believed that by not treading carefully they could unintentionally put the children in harm's way, they could easily make a mistake.

"What about Sam's…um…magic?" asked Daniel stammering under the usually unused word in his vocabulary. "Couldn't we just…ya know, use Telepathy?"

Sam shook her head, "Daniel, I'm not that strong. Anyway, last time I did magic while in the same room as Teal'c his symbiote got agitated," they had discovered that the Jaffa warrior's symbiote was sensitive to magic and although it never hurt the Jaffa it was pretty discomforting. "So, it wouldn't be a good idea even if I could do it."

Anyway, all she could do at the moment was make a pen move and a moving pen wasn't going to scare a vampire much. Then she smirked, a moving stake would scare it though.

Daniel spoke up and voice something on his mind that had been bugging him, "I'm still had a little trouble getting used to using words like 'supernatural' and 'magic' it's just…strange," he looked at the blonde. "Are you sure these are demons and not aliens." He looked from Sam to Jack with his eyebrows raised slightly.

Sam nodded, "I know it's…strange but I remember Willow's memories, I can remember finding out about demons and vampires after-" she looked away with a pained expression on her face. "-Jesse was killed and turned into one, I can remember that our- Willow's and Xander's first fight was against an Apocalypse-making vampire called 'The Master' which we didn't actually see until the end of the sophomore year."

Jack nodded, "There are way too many things that add up when we look at the deaths and disappearances in Sunnydale and remember our memories," he thought for a second before saying. "The Principle was eaten by wild animals, officially."

Daniel swallowed nervously, "Unofficially?"

Jack looked at him and then said, "Me and some weird teenagers were possessed by hyenas."

Daniel looked horrified, "You didn't eat him, right?"

Jack smiled dryly, "No, I just ate the pig."

Daniel sighed in relief, then he looked revolted, "A pig, was it cooked?"

Jack looked slightly green, "No, it was a moving, snorting pig before the pack and I ate it."

"Eeew," said the archaeologist, eyes wide. Then his shook himself mentally. "So, you're sure that…these aren't just aliens."

Jack just gave a 'trust me' look while Sam nodded with conviction.

Sam smirked inwardly, she could make objects float- it was pretty obvious. She had researched on it before believing it completely, and the timing was just too damn perfect. The memories coincided with the facts and then cover-ups on the news that she'd dragged up online, the news that rarely ever made it outside Sunnydale.

She could see that Daniel wasn't completely convinced but she knew that he'd find out eventually.

Sam felt a little guilty, they'd gotten way off track. She looked at Xand- the Colonel who was obviously thinking the same thing.

"Alright campers," he said. "Back on track."

They took a few moments to get the thread of the conversation back.

After remembering what Teal'c said about agreeing with her to be cautious in contacting the Scoobies the Astrophysicist knew that they had to think of everything that could possibly go wrong so that they could prevent it from happening, she looked at her CO and said, "Sir, I think that we should consider everything that could go wrong, Teal'c's right we should be careful."

Teal'c inclined his head slightly at the blonde and looked at Jack.

Sam noticed that Daniel looked like he wanted to say something, he was frowning slightly in contemplation, "Hey Daniel, what do you think about all of this?"

Daniel had the look of worry on his face and replied, "Teal'c, is your symbiote old enough to be able to find a new host…you know, if it's no longer able to survive in you?"

Teal'c considered this for a moment, "Yes, Daniel Jackson, why do you ask?"

Daniel looked at Jack, "Would Teal'c's symbiote be able to take a vampire as a host?" the tension seemed to fill the room even more, the archaeologist shifted a little and looked at his best friend.

Jack swore under his breath, "No, but it could use a demon as a host." He repressed a shudder.

A demon with a Goa'uld in them, he could think of nothing worse. A demon that was as evil as the parasite within it, a parasite that could access the power in the host and also the memories that they both had.

"A vampire changes people into vampires as well, they retain the memories," Jack rubbed his face with his hands and groaned. "What if Teal'c gets Vampified?"

The symbiote would leave and Teal'c would be a very powerful vampire with knowledge of the Stargate, this wasn't looking too promising.

Teal'c looked at the leader of the team he resided in, "O'Neill, it would be most unwise for me to go to Sunnydale, I would most likely put you and the young warriors in danger, I will remain behind."

Sam nodded agreeing, "Teal'c's a security risk, what if the demon community found out about the stargate?" Jack looked down and grimaced.

His 2IC was right, if information on the stargate got out to the demon community the SGC could expect a large group of demons and vampires to show up, "If the demons find out about the stargate…they'd storm the place, they'd kill the personnel and probably turn them into vampires." He said quietly. "And then they'd run the place."

The team sat in a more-than-awkward silence as this sunk in, Daniel looked a little sick, Jack was scowling, Sam's eyes were wide and Teal'c was…Teal'c.

Jack suddenly kicked the table making them- minus Teal'c- jump in shock, the alien just raised an eyebrow, "Fuck," he muttered. "Carter, you can't go either."

Sam's heart plummeted at his words, "But, sir-

Sam had naquadah in her blood, if the vampires managed to grab her- who knows what Carter and Teal'c's blood could do to the vampires.

What if their eyes glowed? Creepy.

"Carter, you're as much a security risk as Teal'c," he said and he knew that as he said that to her she understood what he was talking about.

Jolinar's memories, the naquadah in her blood and the protein marker that the Tok'ra had left in the woman, all were things that the demons and vampires could access.

Daniel nodded, "Jack's got a point, Jolinar's memories would be something that a vampire could handle if one of them ever made her into one of them." They definitely hadn't thought this through properly.

Jack got up from the chair he was sitting on and started pacing restlessly, "It's not just Sam and Teal'c, we all have information on the SGC that the demons and vampires could use."

Daniel took his glasses off, "We can't go, Jack." He said with conviction, though his tone was laced with disappointment. "Sam's right about our right to put the kids in danger, we have none. And it's not just the kids, it's the SGC we could endanger, the other planets off world, not to mention that our planet would be at risk if the SGC was infiltrated."

Sam pitched in, "If the Goa'uld finds out that there are demons, vampires, witches and Slayers occupying Earth, they might be more determined to invade or destroy us."

Jack's headache was getting harder and harder to ignore as he started to feel queasy, he blocked in out stubbornly.The idea of going to Sunnydale and helping those kids was fading away in the wake of reality.

Daniel added his own views and looked very serious, "Or maybe they won't destroy the planet, maybe they'll just get friendly with the vampires, demons and witches, ya know, the bad ones. They'd control out home-world and then move on through the stargate to other planets, like the Tok'ra's planet or Chulack or-" he looked at the others. "-maybe even the Nox, I mean they HAVE got powers that we don't, they could probably find a way to the planet."

In Jack's entire four years of knowing Daniel he'd never known him to be judgmental, he was always the last to accuse someone- unless it was a Goa'uld, then there was a definite lack of trust.

Sam and Teal'c were surprised as well, though it was kinda hard to tell with Teal'c, you could never be too sure.

Daniel noticed the surprised looks and said, "I'm trusting, not brain-defective, these demons and vampires are naturally evil, just like the Goa'uld and they're making kids fight a war."

Sam nodded, "We could be looking at a potential foothold situation." Suddenly going to Sunnydale didn't seem so appealing anymore, there was too much that could go wrong, too many risks- risks that the Scooby gang didn't even know SG1 were going to take.

Jack sat back down and rubbed his closed eyes, "There's got to be another way we can help them, I'm not just going to sit back and let them put their asses in danger for a world that doesn't give a crap!"

Daniel looked at Jack, "There are people on this planet that care, Jack. Us and probably others as well." It's a small percentage but it's there so it counts.

Sam silently agreed, "We'll find another way, Colonel. We're going to help them." They were going to help, she was determined to.

Jack's lips twitched for a moment before tightening into a grimace of pain as his headache steadily turned into a migraine, he'd get some painkillers soon.

"We could really screw things up for those kids if go down there and get ourselves turned," said Sam more to herself than to the others. "We'll find another way to help them without being in direct contact with them; otherwise we'll screw it up for everybody."

Jack scowled and glared at the table near Carter, "How exactly are we going to do that, Major?" if she had an idea he would be more than happy to listen to it, just as long as she didn't turn it into techno-babble.

Sam looked at him for a few moments, "When I come up with something I'll let you know."

Damn.

After a moment she smiled, "I have Willow's Email address," she looked at her CO. "We can help them through that."

Peachy.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10 part one

Willow grinned happily as she found that 'Jolinar' was emailing her again, they were always swapping advice about magic and encouraging each other, her friend had advised her to learn the basics before learning the rest.  
That was a good idea.  
The redhead had been getting emails from 'Jolinar' for the past few days and had enjoyed talking to her immensely, she had easily worked out who was talking to her, and there was only one person who would use a Tok'ra's name. Samantha Carter.

Willow didn't call her up on it because she didn't want to make Sam leave, she was after all the only wiccan friend she had. Well, there was Giles but he never encouraged her and he always clucked his tongue disapprovingly and hid the spell books, Ms. Calendar was a good magic teacher when she had the time to be, but she had her computer classes, homework to grade and Giles to be all romantic with.  
So that left Willow without a friend to share magic with, then Sam came along and now she was getting advice from a responsible adult how to be responsible for the power that she had and the power that she might gain.

She had told Xander about the emails because she knew that he wouldn't tell anyone and because they were a lot closer than they had ever been.

The redheaded witch was trying a few good techniques that she hadn't done. Willow prepared to work her magic, she got off her chair and climbed onto her bed and sat in the middle cross-legged; she closed her eyes, slowed her breathing, she concentrated on inhaling and exhaling and trying to control it.  
She needed to do this a few times a day to keep her balanced and to center herself, especially if she was doing magic. She shut out the noises outside her bedroom window, she ignored the twittering birds and the wind jostling the trees.

It was sorta like Kel-no-reem Willow remembered that Teal'c did that a lot. She could vaguely feel the magic in her, she could also feel the odd stuff running through her veins along with her blood. It scared her slightly because the magic and the stuff in her veins connected and mixed, she wondered if that would make her magic different.

There was one way to find out…

She opened her eyes slowly and concentrated on the half-melted ice-cube in front of her, she reached inside her and drew up some magic, "Ignis incende." The ice burned but only melted quicker than normal, but she did see it smolder slightly before sputtering out.  
"Huh, the fire was a nada," she sighed and then looked at the wet patch on her bed. "Well, at least something happened."

The redhead typed to 'Jolinar'.

MagicSoldier: Nothing, nada, zilch.

Jolinar: Just keep trying, just remember don't skip past learning the basics and just respect your magic okay.

MagicSoldier: Okay, oh, well. The ice cube did melt quicker and there was a LITTLE fire- it was just…real puny.

Jolinar: that's great, at least something happened- I still can't lift a heavy book up from the table yet. Don't expect too much of yourself so soon. You remember Uncle Ben's words right?

MagicSoldier: oh yeah, "With great power comes great responsibility." Hey, thanks for telling me about that, I haven't been much with the responsibility so far. As for the Telekinesis, it'll happen soon, I guess it just takes practice.

Joliner: Thanks, and don't forget Uncle Ben's words- they're true, even if it is from a children's cartoon.

MagicSoldier: I won't. Still, my magic isn't 'great' though, it's kinda little. Not that I want it to be great, that would be scary.

Jolinar: the saying basically means that however big or little your power is you're responsible for every last bit of it. Besides, I think you're doing great.

MagicSoldier: Thanks (: I don't think you're doing too bad yourself :D

Jolinar:D uh oh, I have to go, work's calling me! I'll speak to you in a little while (:

MagicSoldier: okay, bye

Jolinar: bye.

Sam was right, she shouldn't expect so much of herself. She wished she could though.

She wished that Giles would teach her how to do magic but he had his responsibilities with Buffy, Sam didn't know much about magic but she was teaching Willow some things that had slipped her own mind. She was just a kid, a sensible kid, but still a kid and she made mistakes, hopefully Sam's advice would prevent many of them.

After all, Sam didn't have the foolishness that teenagers did, even smart teenagers could slip up.

Willow looked slightly worried and held that feeling, she needed to be careful.

Willow scowled a little after a minute, "Why can't it be as easy as just saying "Ignis incende" then my problems would be solved."

As she said the incantation the second time she waved her hands a little in agitation and failed to notice the three candles on the small desk light up on fire as she walked out of her room.

Ten minutes later

Willow bounced down the stairs two at a time while holding tight to the wooden railings and then jumped over the last three steps and raced to the front door as the doorbell rung for the hundredth time in the last few minutes. The redhead wrenched it open feeling a little irritated and saw that Buffy was at the door looking a little pissed off.

"Buffy, what-" Willow didn't get to finish her question as her blonde friend pushed her way passed her and into the house, she noticed that the blonde had some crispy-looking leaves stuck in her hair.

"Demon, ugly, weak-looking demon," she said looking a little tired. "Can I use your phone to get Giles?"

Willow nodded and led her to the phone immediately, she bit her tongue to stop herself from asking questions that the blonde obviously wouldn't want to answer. She watched as Buffy grabbed the phone and started punching in the numbers, then she paused and waited for the answering male voice.

Buffy's hazel eyes widened slightly as her Watcher answered the phone, "Giles? We got a demon-problem." She listened to what Giles was saying then said. "We'll be there in an hour."

She hung up and turned to Willow and was about to say something before she stopped as she finally properly looked at her redhead buddy, "Willow, what are you wearing!?"

Willow grinned and snickered, the look on Buffy's face was priceless!

Willow then frowned and looked down at herself, she was wearing cargo pants, a black long-sleeved shirt and boots- so why was Buffy looking like that? "What?" she asked in confusion.

Buffy looked at her shy, redheaded friend dressed in what looked like soldier-clothes and then looked at her wide and confused green eyes, "Willow, what…what are you wearing!?" she repeated looking a bit freaked.

The witch shrugged, "Just my patrol gear, Buff." What did she expect her to wear when fighting vampires- flowery skirts?! Well, okay so she used to do that, but since she'd been possessed at Halloween she realized that pants were easier to fight in than skirts.

Buffy looked surprised, "'Patrol gear'?" she repeated with her eyebrows raised. When has Willow ever worn patrol gear? Was there a patrol gear that she didn't know about? No, she didn't think so.

Willow smiled humorously, "Yeah, ever since the Halloween incident I've been thinking that wearing skirts isn't such a good idea in combat situations, the combatant would be…well, restricted in terms of movement. So I think this is the appropriate attire for engaging in a fight against vampires…" she gulped as she realized that Buffy was looking at her like she had grown another head.

She cringed; she wished she didn't keep slipping up like this without meaning to. Even if the stuff she was saying was true, the thing that bothered her was that the OLD Willow hadn't and wouldn't ever think like that. She wondered how much she had changed in the eyes of her friends.

"Wow, Willow," said Buffy looking almost lost for words. "Um, well, I guess you can wear whatever you want to." She smiled at her friend, her little Willow seemed to be growing up; it was good for her.

Willow nodded, "Xander's probably going for the same outfit." Add that to Xander cutting his hair and it really looked like they had actually grown up, which they had.

Buffy nodded and said, "So…the demon."

Willow nodded, "Let's go."

A few hours later

The Sunnydale High school library was in a state of disarray; books were strewn across the large table beneath the wooden railings above it that went around the numerable stacks full of books. The large table was currently occupied by Willow, Xander, Buffy and Giles who were researching- well, Willow and Giles were researching while Xander juggled three soft balls and Buffy twirled a stake in her hand.  
Willow turned over a page of the book she was reading, she looked at the illustration of a pale, weedy-looking demon covering the left page and blinked; she turned to Buffy and said, "Buffy, is this the demon?" she pushed the book towards the blonde. "It's called 'Daelus'."

The blonde Slayer stopped twirling the stake immediately and studied the picture, she nodded slowly, "Yeah, I pretty sure it is." She looked at Willow and said. "It was dark out, but I'm still sure it's the demon we're looking for."

Giles and Xander had both stopped what they were doing to look at the two girls, the Slayer stood up and grasped her stake tightly, "How do I kill it?" she asked.

Xander smirked, "Snap the guy like a twig?" the demon was skinny enough.

Buffy shook her head, "Don't underestimate it, Xand. It's stronger than it looks." It had been a struggle for her to get away from the demon.

"You need to use a wooden weapon, Buff," explained Willow as she looked at the text. This demon looked harmless, but you should always expect the unexpected.

Buffy held up her stake and grinned, "Problem solved." She jumped off her chair and looked ready for a fight, but Willow stopped her and elaborated on the text.

"The wood needs to be Oak, apparently they're susceptible to it," she stated and then looked at them and away from the book. "The Daelus demon has a very thin layer of Oak wood over its skeleton, but that wood has the demon's blood mixed in with it. According to this the fact that the wood in its body had been so contaminated that another contamination will kill it even if it is something that's already analogous to its interior."

Willow finished and looked at her friends, the Slayer looked as confused as hell, Xander was half asleep and Giles was looking quite surprised at her. Xander shook himself awake and looked at her exasperated. "Bottom-line it for me, okay."

"Uh, we need Oak wood to kill it," she said looked vaguely uncomfortable.

Xander threw his arms up into the air and said, "You couldn't have just said that?" Willow rolled her eyes exasperatedly.

"How are we going to get Oak wood?" she asked pointedly. Giles stood up and polished his glasses before replacing them.

"In the cemetery near the Ice cream place," informed Giles after a second. They looked at him confusedly. "I remember reading about how many cemeteries there were in Sunnydale before arriving there- one chap commented on most the trees there being oak."

Xander looked incredulous, "And you remembered that?" Giles nodded.

Forty minutes later the Scoobies were walking around the dark cemetery quietly, the blonde turned to the redhead and asked, "How do we know if we're using the right tree?"

Willow answered, "We don't, we just pick a few trees each and then we're likely to get the right one." Buffy nodded and continued picking some trees to snap the branches off.

Willow wanted to take the branches of all the trees home so that she could analyze them properly, but she knew that they didn't have the time to do that or the equipment so she kept the thoughts to herself. She wondered where the demon was now.

She vaguely heard some crumbling sounds, the pre-possessed Willow would have failed to notice this but the Sam in her did and she turned around in time to flip a young vampire over her shoulder and onto the ground preventing her from being bitten by it. She grabbed her stake and plunged it into the vamp's unbeating heart; he disintegrated into a cloud of dust.

Xander looked concerned as he watched her, she smiled at him triumphantly to let him know that she was fine, he grinned, "Nice one, Will."

The redhead nodded, "No problem, sir." Buffy's eyebrows were immediately in danger of disappearing into her hairline while Xander looked befuddled.  
Damn it! She hated it when she slipped up like this, and now she'd slipped up in front of Buffy…again! Oh well, there are a lot stranger things than calling your best friend 'Sir'.

"'Sir?'" asked Buffy looking confused. "Willow, you and Xander have been acting wiggy the last couple of months, what's going on?" You didn't call your best friend 'Sir' because you're growing up.

Willow gulped inaudibly and wracked her brains for an explanation that didn't involve the truth, it was Xander who saved them, "It's nothing, Buff. Willow's just got a bad headache and neither of us has been feeling too good. Maybe we've got a cold or something."

Buffy nodded taking the explanation at face-value and then turned to her redheaded buddy, "Great technique you used there, how did you learn it?"  
Willow wasn't a physical-fighting person; she had made that fact known a few times over the two years that they'd been fighting the forces of darkness. So why was she suddenly flipping vampires like pancakes?

"Uh, I watch you fight vamps, Buff," Willow said trying to keep her voice steady. She wasn't a good liar, the soldier-possession had improved her lying capabilities a little but whether or not she was good at it she hated lying. Especially to her friends. "And you know that Xander and I have been using the gym a lot."

The Slayer nodded and smiled, "Look at you, fight-y Willow!" Willow grinned and pushed the guilt down.

"Children!" they turned as they heard Giles calling them. "Enough talking, we have got a demon to kill."

They nodded and stashed their branches in the big leather bag that was usually used for carrying axes and crossbows.

By two in the morning, three and a half hours later, they had left the library for the second time after breaking into the school in the night. They'd found six oak branches, they used knives to shape the ends of the branches into sharp, thick points and then had shortened the handles of the branches. They now had a couple of weapons each.

Willow rubbed her tired eyes sleepily and tried to cover her yawn, Buffy caught it and said, "Are you sure you wanna come out, Will?"

The redhead nodded, "You bet I am! Demon ass-kicking here I come!"

Buffy smiled, "Thanks, Will."

Willow noticed that Xander was a little behind them and turned, "Hey, Xand, you know that you could just leave those things there. It's not like there's anyone here to find the stuff."

Xander put one of the books that were strewn across the library and was about to shove it into a random shelf, "I know, but if Snyder get suspicious again and decides to come out to the school and finds this stuff we're screwed."

Willow rolled her eyes, "Oh, come on!" she walked over to him and grabbed his forearm. "What are the odds of that happening?"

"But-" he started protesting, but the redhead dragged him through the library door to catch up with the others.

Giles had done a locater spell to find the demon's 'home', it was in one of the other cemetery's many crypts, now all they had to do was find out which crypt held the demon, before it killed another innocent person.

Willow came out of one crypt with Giles behind her, she looked at Buffy who came out of the crypt opposite them and shook her head tiredly indicating that they hadn't found the demon. The blonde slayer sighed and turned to Xander who was coming out of the same crypt, he looked bored and was juggling his two stakes.

Buffy made a beeline to Giles and Willow quickly, "Giles, are you sure you did the spell right?" she hoped that her mom hadn't noticed her absence at the house or she was in deep shit.

Giles looked offended, "Yes, of course I am," he took his glasses from his nose and started polishing. "I suppose we just need to look harder, we should branch out so we can cover more ground.

They nodded and went off to search for the demon again.


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 10 part two will the astro

After over an hour of searching crypt after crypt Willow had felt a strange feeling tugging in the back of her mind and in her stomach, after the next twenty minutes of finding no demon and of weird feelings she gave up trying to ignore the feeling and listened to it. She felt the blood in her veins heat up, she looked around the cemetery and saw trees, her friends, grass and two crypts in her visual distance. She closed her eyes without even realizing it and took an unconscious step to the right, she opened her eyes and saw the crypt in the corner of her right eye.

She and her friends had already looked in that crypt, but the feeling became more intense and she felt the need to search the crypt again, she knew subconsciously that there was something in there that was calling her. She walked towards it and opened the door slowly, the stale air greeted her again as she walked through the door.  
She sighed in exasperation, just like Buffy had said there was 'only a coffin-thing inside the crypt' an albeit odd-looking coffin but coffins usually looked weird to them, maybe it was the vampires.

Her blood boiled and rushed through her veins and the feeling grew stronger as she looked at the dust-covered coffin. She stood next to it and looked at it curiously as she realized that the coffin was shaped oddly, it was round on the ends and then straight and rectangular between the circles. She touched the coffin and brushed the dust from it and tried to block the strange feelings.

She kept wiping the dust off the whole coffin in an attempt to clean it to see if it was just a coffin or something else, a fleeting memory flashed in her mind but she shook it away, now wasn't the time. Her hand brushed something spherical and she felt the coffin move.

It was opening, with a mixture of fear and keen interest she gulped and stepped away to look at the whole thing, she noticed for the first time that the top of the coffin, which was splitting apart and spreading in two different directions, had markings on it, faintly familiar markings.

The coffin, or whatever it was, was now fully open, she waited with anticipation and trepidation to see what would happen next. Nothing happened, except that the odd feeling in her had gotten a hell of a lot more intense. She got irritated at the feeling and willed it away recklessly; she felt something loosen inside her.

The crypt door swung shut by itself so hard the entire place shook and dust partially filled it, coughing; Willow tried waving the dust away from her and squinted to see what was going on. It was completely dark now.

"Swell, just what I need," she muttered sarcastically. "A nice, dark crypt place."

Shaking her head, Willow tried to feel her way through the dark towards the door, "Why did it close?" she gasped as her knee connected painfully with a very hard object, she tried to get around it but it was pretty big. Eventually she ended up almost falling into it completely as she went into it head and shoulders first.  
She placed her hands in the coffin in an attempt to push herself out of it, her hand grabbed an object, "Huh?" she pushed herself out and landed on her butt on the floor still holding the object.

The coffin lit up the whole room and she saw that she was holding a weird-looking gold, metal device with a red stone attached to it and the end of the device which curled and spiraled. As she looked at it closely she saw that the device looked like it was made to fit around a person's arm, a memory flooded her before she could fend it off.

She was Jolinar of Malkshur, a Tok'ra, enemy of the Goa'uld. She had a device wrapped around her hand and arm which was glowing, she could feel the energy flowing through her. She concentrated.

Now she was Sam Carter, she was kneeling on the ground looking at the same device which was also wrapped around her hand. The device lit up.

She pointed it at the ground and concentrated; an energy-wave flew from the device and scorched the ground.

Willow's eyes snapped open and she saw the ceiling of the crypt above her, she got up and was puzzled, "Holy Hannah," she muttered to herself. She got to her feet and held the device in her hands. Against her better judgment she put the device on, and concentrated.

She jumped in fright and shock as the energy-wave blew the wall opposite her almost to pieces, she yanked it off her hand and stared at it looked and feeling a little scared. Then scraps of knowledge filled her mind, she studied them. After learning more about the device she was a little less scared of it.

She dragged her eyes from the hand-device and looked at the coffin- no, the sarcophagus, which was usually used to hold a Goa'uld host, she looked inside it… nothing. She jumped as the sarcophagus started closing.

She ran to the door and opened it before the sarcophagus fully closed so that she wasn't left in the dark again, she started to make her way outside before remembering that the supernatural could access the, obviously, alien technology. She and Xander had sworn to make sure that the supernatural never found out about aliens.

The feeling of wanting to destroy the sarcophagus made a different but slightly familiar feeling bubble up inside her fast, by natural instinct she tried to get rid of the overwhelming feeling and again felt something loosen inside her. She heard the sarcophagus fizzle and crackle fiercely though she couldn't see it from where she was standing, which was outside the crypt.  
She walked back inside it and was surprised to see that the dusty, gold coffin had been completely blackened as if it had been charred with fire, the markings were almost completely unreadable. She touched the sphere but it didn't open, it was destroyed. She had destroyed it.

Fear at herself was mixing in with the relief that the thing was completely unusable and therefore useless to any of the supernatural, the secret was still under wraps. But how had she done that? Was it magic? After all, she had been practicing a lot lately. But so far she had barely been able to levitate one of Giles's heavy books, she could float a pencil but not a big, heavy book.

With a sickening feeling of guilt she realized she couldn't hear her friends, still holding the device she ran from the crypt, "Buffy!? Xan?!"

She jogged across the cemetery until she heard fighting noises coming from the crypt to her left, she ran inside after pulling her oak-weapon out of one of her pockets. Xander, she saw, was being dragged down by two vampires while Buffy was struggling with the Daelus demon. Willow ran over to Xander and kicked one of the vampires in the face before staking it with her oak-weapon.  
Her dark-haired friend decked the other vampire and staked it, he looked at her, "Where've you been?"

"I'll explain later!" she heard the demon yell in anger and pain and saw that Buffy had stabbed the thing in the eye, she watched as it teetered for a few seconds before collapsing in a boneless heap to the ground.

After a few silent moments they heard a loud noise to the left of the building, they jumped and raised their weapons. It was just Giles, he held his head looking dazed, "I got knocked out again, why is it always me?"

Buffy looked relieved and hugged him, "Ow," he complained.

Xander looked at her and muttered, "Tomorrow morning, 11am, your house." Willow nodded, that was when she would tell him what she'd found. It was a good thing it was Saturday tomorrow.

She put the device on quickly and pulled her sleeve over it.


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter 11

Spoiler Warning: 'Upgrades'

"So, where did you find it?" asked Xander curiously and looked at the device suspiciously. He hated the Goa'uld and he was a little freaked out that his best friend had a Goa'uld hand device usually used for torturing innocent people- and SG1.

"In one of the crypts," replied Willow biting her lip with worry. "There was a sarcophagus in there, I accidentally opened it and this is what I found." She gestured to the hand-device which was on the table a couple of feet away from them.

Xander gaped; "There's a SARCOPHAGUS on the HELLMOUTH!?" he swallowed hard. "Well, that's nice," he said sarcastically. Alien technology in Sunnydale, could things get any weirder?

The redhead smirked at his sarcasm, "It's okay, Xan. I destroyed the sarcophagus." With my really scary magic. Willow flopped onto the sofa near her and looked worried. "I didn't mean to though."

Xander sat down beside her and looked concerned, "Was it bad? You didn't hurt yourself did you?" he checked her over quickly for any signs of concealed injuries.

Willow shook her head, "No Xan, it just wigged me out." She shook her head as she remembered the charred remains of the sarcophagus. "I couldn't control it, it just came out of me- not even Buffy would've been able to survive that if it hit her. What if I hurt someone? I don't want to hurt anyone, i-it's not me; still if it's a demon then…yay, score for the Scoobies…but what if it's not a demon?- what if it's—

Xander grabbed her by the shoulders, "Will, breathe. Panicking isn't going to help." Then he thought for a second. "Neither will babbling."

Willow flushed red with embarrassment, she was grateful that he'd stopped her babbling before it became one huge babble-fest; she frowned, she needed to control her power as quickly as possible before she hurt Xander…and her friends. Maybe Sam could help her.

"We should get Giles," said Xander. "He knows about that magic stuff." He looked confused when the redhead started shaking her head, he noticed her bright red hair shimmer in the fluorescent light and swallowed nervously. "What is it?"

"We can't tell Giles about my magic."

"Why not?" asked Xander then he started. "Oh, right; the Naquadah." Giles might sense something off about Willow's magic if he paid close attention to it, then there'd be questions, then they'd find out about Aliens and then the demon community would eventually find out which would lead to everything, and everyone, going to Hell.

Willow nodded, "Exactly, I'm going to let Sam know about my magic problems." The blonde probably wouldn't be able to do much other than encourage her to keep her magic in check.

"I don't think she'll be much of a help," commented Xander.

"I know, but I want to tell her this stuff," admitted the redhead awkwardly. "Besides you, she's the only person I can talk to about it." Xander nodded and felt a jolt of pride at being one of Willow's two confidants.

Willow picked up the hand device and inspected it thoughtfully; the dark-haired adolescent noticed this and said, "Do you know how to activate it?"

The redhead glanced at him before putting the device on, she flexed her hand experimentally and moved her hand forwards so that the palm of her hand- and the red crystal- was facing the ground; she concentrated. The device emitted a glow and then the energy blast scorched the carpet.

Both teenagers were silent for a few moments; Willow swallowed and looked guilty, "Maybe I should have practiced outside." Her parents were going to kill her when they saw their carpet.

Xander slowly turned to her, "Ya think?"

The patch of blackened carpet smoked slightly.

At the SGC

Jack looked over Sam's shoulder at the computer screen, reading what was being typed. The noises from outside Carter's Lab were muffled by the closed door so that they could communicate with their friends without being uninterrupted. The blonde bit her lip as she read something off the screen.

MagicSoldier: I didn't mean to blow it up, I can't control it. Xander was thinking about telling Giles, but we can't- ya know, because of the Naquada.

Jolinar: So, the Sarcophagus is completely destroyed? Nothing can use it?

MagicSoldier: Pretty much, it was just a charred mess the last time I saw it. What if one of the gang had gotten in the way?

Jolinar: Don't think about that, you'll just upset yourself. No one was hurt, okay. As for telling Giles about this- you know the risks, it's not a good idea.

MagicSoldier: I know it isn't- and I'll try not to think about the Sarcophagus incident, but I have to control this and if I can't go to Giles who can I go to? You're a good magic-friend but you know more or less the same as me- which is not a lot really.

Jolinar: I know, I suppose we'll just have to be cautious about this.

MagicSoldier: Yeah. Xander says the same thing.

Jolinar: Is he there with you?

Sam looked at her CO, Jack nodded and sat down at the computer chair as she got off it. Jack tensed and hoped that Xander hadn't received his memory of Charlie.

MagicSoldier: Yeah, I'll put him on now, does Jack want to talk to him?

Jolinar: I sure do

MagicSoldier: Hi Sir- oh, here's Xander…

MagicSoldier: So, Jack- how're you doing?

Jolinar: Great, hey kid I wanted to ask you something?

MagicSoldier: Ask away…

Jolinar: You didn't happen to get my memory of Charlie, right?

They waited for the response for a minute and they looked at each other, they already knew the answer.

MagicSoldier: You mean the memory where Charlie got my gun?

Jack rubbed his eyes looking more than a little upset, "Shit." The kid didn't deserve that memory, neither had deserved what had happen to them.

Jolinar: Yeah, that one.

MagicSoldier: Yeah, got that. Here's Willow.

Jack grimaced, he couldn't blame the kid for not wanting to talk about the subject. He never talked about it either- not really anyway. It brought back the memory that he would rather forget.

MagicSoldier: Hi Jack, it's Willow- Xander didn't feel like talking.

Jolinar: I understand. Completely.

Jack looked at his 2IC, "Wanna take over?

The blonde nodded and he stood up from the chair a second before, "Unscheduled Off-world Activation!" they looked at each other for a moment.

"Carter, sign off the computer and meet me there," he ordered then he went out of the room quickly, he wondered if the Goa'uld were visiting, it wouldn't be the first time they'd turned up unannounced, the slimy bastards.

Sam Carter typed in the last few words quickly.

Jolinar: It's me again, we gotta go. Probable snake trouble. Bye.

MagicSoldier: Goodluck.

Sam ran out of the lab quickly and followed her CO to the Stargate barely missing the armed SF's streaming down the halls towards the 'gate-room. She wondered who was at 'gate, she didn't think it was the Tollan.

When she got into the 'gate room she saw that the Iris was already closed over the event horizon, the General was already standing at the foot of the ramp looking slightly cautious as he always did while waiting for the unknown people at the other end of the Stargate to fully dial in. Teal'c, she saw, was already there and standing beside the balding man as was Jack.

Sam saw a SF shift slightly in the corner of her eye as she stood beside the Jaffa, she turned to the left of her as she heard one of the doors slide open and saw the team's archaeologist, Daniel, walk into the room.

General Hammond looked at him, "Doctor Jackson."

"The message I got was pretty vague," replied Daniel as he pulled on his dark-green jacket.

"That was the transmission we got from the Tok'ra," informed the General.

Which was usually 'pretty vague'.

"They say who was coming?" asked Daniel curiously.

"No," the General pursed his lips slightly in annoyance.

"Did they say why?" asked Jack hiding his suspicion.

Sam answered, "No sir."

"Now, you see, that's rude," he quipped wryly. "I hate that."

"Receiving Tok'ra IDC," someone said over the PA. "Opening the Iris."

The Iris span open to reveal a lake-like wall inside the shape of the 'gate, it shimmered and filled the room with an eerie blue light.

Jack continued, "In fact, the Tok'ra are starting to annoy me in general."

"Sir?" Sam asked feeling concerned.

"Don't get me wrong, Carter," he amended. "Your dad's great, I love him like a brother. It's just that every time they show up it seems that there's all kinds of-

He paused as he saw two people coming from the Stargate, a pretty light-brown haired woman and a man carrying a big box, they stood on the ramp, he saw that the woman had a faintly arrogant air about her as she looked around the 'gateroom.

"Yep, that looks like trouble to me," Daniel said quietly as they looked at her silently.

The Stargate shut down before both the Tok'ra started walking down the ramp towards them slowly.

Sam smiled at them feeling slightly awkward, thanks to Willow's personality and her own caution.

"The high-council of the Tok'ra sends it's greeting," she said, her voice was metallic-sounding and almost inhuman.

"I'm General Hammond," the man informed and then gestured to the four people beside him. "Colonel O'Neill, Doctor Jackson, Major Carter and Teal'c."

Sam nodded at them, still smiling while Teal'c inclined his head slowly in greeting.

The woman turned to the dark-haired man and introduced him, "This is Mornath, you may call me Anise."

Daniel glanced at Jack before saying, "'Anise'" an unusual name.

"It means 'noble strength'," she stated in her strange metallic voice.

"I'm Daniel," the archaeologist informed. "It means, uh, God is my judge."

Anise nodded while Jack looked surprised. "I'm Jack, it means-

He considered this for a moment knowing that he had no idea what his name meant, "What's in the box?" now that was a much simpler question with an answer that he hope was just as simple. Though, knowing the Tok'ra, it probably wasn't.

They were now in the briefing room sitting around the table a little while later.

Anise opened the weird-looking box and took out an even weirder looking dark-blue glove-type machine at least that's what it looked like to Jack, it was probably Goa'uld technology. She shut the box and began speaking.

"These armbands were recently discovered amongst some ancient ruins on a remote planet," she handed it to Jack.

Daniel inspected the armband, "I don't recognize the symbols, may i-" Jack handed the armband to Sam to pass on to him.

"The language belongs to a race call the 'Atoneeks'," Anise explained. "Their existence and demise pre-dates the Goa'uld."

"'Atoneeks', I think Jolinar knew about these," said Sam snatching the armband from Daniel eagerly. "They're supposed to give the wearer incredible speed and strength, right."

"Yes," agreed Anise. "Many thought it was just a myth, still the Goa'uld and the Tok'ra both sought these devices in time."

"Obviously not a myth," said Daniel.

"The Tok'ra were very excited when I found them," she said.

Daniel raised his eyebrows, "You found them."

"My areas of expertise are ancient cultures," she informed.

Daniel's face lit up, "Oh mine too!"

Jack resisted the urge to say, 'Aw, Danny's found new play-mate!'

"Yes, I know."

Sam bit her lip as she curiously wondered what would happen if she used the armband, would it work differently? Would it work the same as the others when she put it on? Would it work at all?

Despite her caution she was more than eager to find out the answers to her questions, it's not like she couldn't take it off if wanted to.

Anise held her right arm out indicating that she wanted the armband given to her. "We had hoped the devices will provide our operatives with a great new physical advantage-"

Jack gave her the device back.

"- to fight against the Goa'uld."

"However…" Jack gestured expectantly.

Anise didn't answer straight away, she just placed the armband on her right arm and clamped the flaps of the device over it but when she let go the flaps sprung open again.

"They don't work for you," stated Daniel looking slightly confused.

"Our top scientific minds have researched the technology at length, to the best of our knowledge they should work," she paused. "However, something causes them to reject the Tok'ra physiology."

Teal'c spoke up, "Your symbiote."

"That is a likely assumption," replied Anise.

"Then the device will most likely be ineffective on me as well," he stated.

Anise nodded, "Which is why I brought only three."

"Uh, I still have a protein marker," said Sam. Not to mention the magic, she added silently.

"Hopefully that'll have no effect," she replied.

Sam frowned. Yeah, hopefully.

"'Incredible speed and strength'" Daniel recited starting feel both excited and curious. They could kick the Goa'uld's butts using the technology.

"In fact according to the inscriptions they should greatly increase all your natural abilities."

Jack turned to Sam, "It sounds kinda cool."

Sam agreed silently but wondered if it would increase her MAGIC ability. Although, technically her magic wasn't NATURAL so maybe it wouldn't effect it at all.

"For the Tok'ra-human alliance I expected you would cooperate."

"Couldn't we take some time to learn a little more about these things," said the General cautiously. "Perhaps Major Carter and Doctor Jackson-

"I had hoped to begin human trial experiments immediately," she interrupted a little too quickly.

"What's the rush?" asked Jack feeling a little suspicious.

Anise looked pissed, "If you are not willing to trust us and participate -"

She placed the armband back in the box.

"- I will find human subjects on another planet."

The General looked like he was thinking about it while Jack raised his eyebrows and pulled a face.

"Fine," said Jack smirking slightly before answering.

Anise closed her eyes and looked like she was concentrating, she opened her eyes and spoke in a human voice "Colonel, please forgive the scientist in Anise, she has worked very hard for this. I assure you every safety precaution shall be taken."

They knew that this was the host talking at that moment.

Anise closed her eyes again and then opened them looking expectant and a little indignant, "What is your answer?"


	13. Chapter 13

Willow the astrophysicist chapter 13

Willow the astrophysicist chapter 13

The Infirmary at that moment was filled with several treadmills and was rather deserted except for three people; which would probably be because one of the three was a Goa'uld, at least in Jack's opinion. The room was rather dark.

Jack sat on the hospital bed, if you could call it that, and waited for Anise to hand him the device. The woman walked away from him and Janet toward a box, she reached in and withdrew two objects. She walked to the Colonel and showed him a circular device with a red flashing light on it, "This is a Tok'ra biosensor, it will monitor every aspect of your physiological condition."

She pulled at the neck of his black shirt and stuck the device on his chest, "Woah," he said as he felt a twinge where the device bit into his skin. He shifted slightly, her hand lingered a little too long down his shirt before she withdrew her hand. Trying to cop a feel, huh? Oookaaay.

"It'll transmit readings to this device where it will recorded for the duration of the experiment," Anise informed both Jack and Janet.

Jack shrugged slightly, "Okay." Whatever. He didn't like this woman, maybe he could sic Carter on her and get her to use her mojo.

Anise turned and walked away from them, Jack grabbed the folder from the table and showed it to Janet who frowned slightly. They looked up as Anise walked back towards them, he quickly put the folder down and tried to look innocent, "Ready?"

"As I'll…ever be," he replied dryly. He rolled up his sleeve and held his arm out and the Tok'ra fixed the armband to his arm. He watched as she consulted a screen, "What's that mean?" he asked curiously as the light on the device turned green

"It means the device is working," she replied.

Uh huh? "I don't feel like leaping any tall buildings," he wasn't disappointed…okay, maybe a little. Why did Carter get the cool powers?

"It'll take time for the device to adjust to your body, it believe it was designed this way to give you a chance to adapt to your new abilities. In the mean time feel free to move around and interact with your environment as you normally would. The biosensor will transmit readings over a significant distance."

"Okay," doesn't sound too complicated. He slid off the bed and walked out of the room. He wondered how Carter would handle this, the armband might end up all screwy if it's used by her. Maybe alien technology could mix with magic, or maybe it wasn't a good idea…things could go wacko there.

Jack bobbed up and down with his gloved-fist raised, he was boxing—with Teal'c, usually he, being a semi-normal guy, would get his ass handed to him if he sparred with the big guy; but Teal'c seemed to be holding back on him for some reason. What? Like he couldn't take him.

Jack blocked another jab easily.

"Do you still feel no affects from the armbands, O'Neill?" he asked as he too danced around.

Obviously, "No, you know something? I'm starting to think this thing is a crock!" he batted away more jabs effortlessly. Okay, Teal'c was definitely holding back!

Jack blocked another shot, "Come on, Teal'c! Bring it! You're going easy."

The air force Colonel noticed with surprise that his buddy was starting to look a little fatigued, Teal'c continued jabbing at him and said, "I am attempting to make physical contact with you, O'Neill. You are boxing with great proficiency today!"

Really? He wasn't even close to being breathless, "I feel a little stiff."

Teal'c quickly executed a flurry of jabs one after the other at his friend, but his glove hit nothing but air as he saw his opponent turn into a blur of quick movement; his stopped his attempted attack and felt completely stunned and confused.

Jack stopped his evading movements and looked at the other guy for a second before taking a lightening-quick swing at him, he heard the big guy grunt at the impact and saw him fall down to the floor out cold.

Had he really done that? Cool!—Really?

"Teal'c?"

Yep, the guy was out. Sweet.

Teal'c sat up on the bed in the Infirmary, one of the nurses walked away from him holding his boxing gloves while Janet stopped in front of him and asked, "So, you're feeling any better?"

"I will be fine, Dr Frasier," he intoned as Jack stood next to him eating a cookie.

"Teal'c," he said. "I'm really sorry." Was he? Ahh…

"You are not," he sounded slightly accusing while his expression remained, as always, stoic.

Jack swallowed his cookie in consideration; yep the big guy was right. "He's right about that." He saw the Doc cross her arms over her chest before giving him a look that stood between exasperation and amusement.

Anise seemingly conjured a silver ball out of thin air and handed it to him saying, "Please, squeeze this."

Jack accepted it, now chewing on a mouthful of food, and inspected it, "What is it?" he noticed that Janet was looking at Anise with…anger? Frustration? Maybe.

"It will measure your strength," she replied to his question. Jack's curiosity strengthened, well, it couldn't hurt to try.

He gave the ball a firm squeeze and looked up at the Tok'ra who was consulting her…board thingy, whatever it was. He looked at it too though he wasn't close enough to actually see it. He listened to her results, 'five times that of a normal human', huh? Neat.

Still, he couldn't resist the witticism that was on the edge of his tongue, "So, no increase then, huh?"

Janet and Anise both gave him amused looks, the Tok'ra continued, "Physiology remains otherwise normal."

Huh, "I-uh-I feel good," he said as he balled up the wrapper in his hand, he threw it across the room before it landed in a translucent cup. "Three!" and his third candy bar finished. His felt his stomach growl with hunger, he remembered Xander's life-long ability to be perpetually hungry even when consuming a ton of food; he remembered, though, that his- Xander's- huge appetite had evaporated a little after eating a pig. Not a cooked-and-called-pork pig, but an actual eaten-while-alive pig that really wasn't cooked. Still, could have been worse; at least he didn't eat the Principle.

"And- uh- you seemed to have developed a bit of a sweet tooth," Janet acknowledged as he took a bite of the cookie.

He had? Huh, he hadn't even noticed…need more food! He stomach rumbled slightly to him.

"Your metabolism is increasing to match the energy your body now requires."

Really? That explained the constant hunger and the need to eat.

Janet leaned in to look at the screen, "You were- uh- gonna show me how to read this." Anise tugged the screen out of Frasier's grip, the Doc looked a little pissed at that.

"I will," Anise said pointedly. "First, it is time to increase the number of subjects in the experiment."

Harris' residence

Xander woke up the next morning to the unmistakable sounds of his dad's drunken yelling, he groaned and rolled over onto his back before staring up at the ceiling; he winced at the sudden, sharp sound of a beer glass shattering as it impacted on the wall, "For cryin' out loud," he mumbled.

"BOY!" Xander cringed as his dad bellowed up the stairs; he felt the usual emotions at what was to come; fear, anxiety, guilt and anger. "GET YOUR WORTHLESS ASS DOWN HERE NOW!" He repressed the expected hurt down at the hatred he heard in Tony Harris's voice, the man had emotionally hurt him for so long now that he'd pushed down the pain before he even recognized it.

The dark-haired boy quickly got off the bed, if he kept his dad waiting too long the beating he'd most likely get would be a lot more painful than usual.

He made his way across his room to the door knocking into a few things as he went. Finally he got to the door and wrenched it open, he sighed; he hated Sundays as that was the day that his dad spent the ENTIRE day drunk out of his mind and his mom just sat on her ass and bitched about her life; how crappy it was and, frequently, how HE had ruined her life.

Xander scowled, he hadn't asked her to screw Tony eighteen years ago so how was it his fault? Sometimes he wished-

"MOVE YOU'RE ASS, BOY!" Tony yelled up again jolting him out of his angry thoughts. "Stupid bastard." Xander's fists clenched as he heard his dad say that.

He wasn't stupid, well okay he wasn't that bright either. Bastard, maybe; his parents never talked to him that much unless it was to insult him so he didn't know if they'd been married before he was born…though, probably not- so yeah, he probably was a bastard. Just not in the way his dad had meant.

Xander ran to the stairs, jumped down them two at a time to save time and then, rather clumsily, tripped over an outstretched foot as his dad tripped him. Ha ha, very funny. Not. He regained his balance due to military training so he didn't fall flat on his face like he usually did.

He heard his dad snort, "Clumsy little bastard, aren't you?" then the man walked, or rather staggered, away from him back to the sofa with an almost-empty bottle of beer in his meaty fist.

It was obvious to Xander that his dad had merely yelled for him…just for the sake of yelling, he hadn't needed his son for anything, unless you count entertainment as a reason for getting him up with the usual round of insults. Beats getting hit, though. He guessed that was something.

His stomach growled with hunger, he looked around the house for anything to eat; not that there was anything. The food he and his parents ate came from take-out places and they always used the money that his mom earned for it or what was left of it as they used the money to buy alcohol and cigarettes, he supposed that because his parents were always drunk that they had completely failed to notice what a state their house had become.

Not that it was much to begin with, it was just a rundown, neglected-looking house in the 'bad part of Sunnydale'. Anyway the outside of the house was nothing compared to the inside which looked a lot worse.

Two-week-old take-out boxes still lay on the wooden floorboards which were dirty, empty beer cans were strewn across the moth-eaten sofa and filthy tea tables; the walls had no wallpaper on them, though it looked like at SOME point it did. The walls were grayish and old-looking and, now that Xander looked closer, it appeared that there were also coffee stains over them- he cringed in disgust.

Best not look too long.

Tony belched loudly and started verbally attacking the lampshade, his beer bottle slipped from his hand and smashed on the floor before a puddle of the liquid spread across the floorboards; the younger Harris watched the puddle spread silently.

He swore that if he ever had kids they'd live in better place than this, a much better place; with better parents.

"Look wha' ya made me do, boy," Tony growled at his only son.

Xander shifted nervously from foot to foot, he should have gotten out of the way quicker; then he would have been spared the inevitable blow that would be given by his father. He gulped as the older man wobbled to his feet and started staggering towards him; he backed up. Ah hell.

He suddenly bolted for the back door which was through the kitchen, he passed a dirty stack of plates, knives, forks and spoons; almost tripped over a huge pile of dirty clothes and then finally made it to the back door which he yanked open. He felt his face screw up in revulsion as he felt cold, sticky stuff stick to the palm of his hand where he'd grasped the door handle, "Ugh."

He ran into the disheveled-looking lawn and took a running leap over the wall that he'd leapt over so many times before and into the street, he landed hard on his ass, as usual, and then sprinted away from the house as fast as possible and ran towards the only place he'd ever felt safe in, or person rather, Willow's house which was a ten minute run away from his own house. A fast run, though. If he were walking calmly it would take him twenty minutes to get there.

It was after ten minutes of running that he realized he was still in the clothes that he'd fell asleep in- a big, rather dirty, shirt that used to be his dad's and a pair of shorts which were not as filthy as the shirt. He winced in pain when he stepped on a small stone and also realized that he had nothing on his feet, "Huh," he huffed feeling the sarcasm well up inside him.

Running out of the house in his night clothes early in the morning was nothing unusual for him, though he usually remembered to put his footwear on; he'd only been caught out without sneakers on maybe two or three times in the entire seventeen years he'd existed. "Aw crap."

He looked around self-consciously thinking that someone could see him outside in his dirty clothes looking like shit, a guy in the next street was walking his dog but didn't notice him and there was no one else outside at that moment. He blushed as he wondered whether anyone had seen him running through the street like a bat out of hell.

He snorted as the sarcasm got the better of him, well if everyone at school teases him about it at school tomorrow then he'd know that someone DID see him. "My life sucks," he muttered dejectedly.

He looked behind him to see if his dad had caught up with him yet, nope he hadn't- probably gave up when he went over the wall- Xander continued walking towards Willow's house; then he smiled slightly. Maybe his life didn't suck so bad, at least he had Will. He had always had Willow backing him up ever since they were four years old- so his life could have been a lot worse.

Xander quickened his pace as he realized that he could be noticed by the public in his night clothes if he didn't hurry it up; he wondered for second whether or not he could get arrested for public indecency- was it public indecency to be outside looking like poverty-stricken orphan boy? He didn't know.

He started running to Willow's house; he didn't want to find out.


	14. Chapter 14

**Warning: Child-abuse flashback- (this IS Xander's home-life I'm talking about and we all know how 'Nice' his parents are).**

**Sunday night**

**SGC**

Major Carter was sitting in the lab running a test on the material the armbands were made of when she heard the door slide open emitting a metallic sound as it did, she ignored it and continued looking though a microscope.

"Sam?"

Huh? Wonder why Janet's here?

"Yeah?" she answered still looking through the microscope. It was pretty interesting down there.

"What're you doing?"

'What was she doing?' What did Janet mean by that? Oh yeah, "Oh, I'm just running a few tests of the material the armbands are made of."

There was a pause and then, "Ah…it's a…little dark, don't ya think?" Dark? What does she mean by that? Wow, this was interesting!

Distracted, she said, "Is it?" it wasn't that dark. Suddenly the brightest of lights glared into her eyes.

"Ow! That's bright!" she said alarmed. She looked around the room now that her eyes had quickly adjusted to the brightness.

"Yeah, the lights were out," Janet explained. The Doctor turned the desk light in front of her on.

Huh, the lights HAD been out. Strange, "I came in, I didn't even realize." She turned to Janet who was twiddling her thumbs.

Maybe it was the armband? She could obviously see perfectly well in the dark, though her magic thankfully hadn't done anything erratic. She was kinda disappointed about that.

A few minutes later she was in the Infirmary looking into a penlight that Janet was shining in her eyes; the Doc clicked the light off, stepped away and put the light back into her jacket pocket, "Well, it looks normal to me."

Sam resisted the urge to snort with amusement, how could this be normal!? "I can see in the dark as well as if the light was on."

She felt the doctor brush some of her short blonde hair away from her left ear before checking her ear temperature and saying, "You're running a slight temperature."

So? "Anise is monitoring out vitals," Sam replied.

"Yes, I know."

Something in her friend's voice caught her attention, "You don't trust her biosensors." That was odd, the technology that the Tok'ra had was a lot more advanced than anything that they had, if you couldn't trust technology THAT advanced what COULD you trust?

"No, I'm sure her technology is very advanced and very accurate," the auburn-haired woman responded vaguely.

Ahh, now she got it. "So, you don't trust her?" so the woman was a Tok'ra, big deal! So was her father. She knew people got a little skittish around the Tok'ra because of the 'Snake' thing, the colonel included, but she didn't expect that from her best friend.

"I'd like to run a full blood screen," Janet confirmed firmly.

Sam barely stopped herself from rolling her eyes at the other woman; Paranoid, geez she just wanted some fun with this stuff. What that so wrong?

She sighed as she felt Janet's eyes on her.

WHOOOHOOO! Jack barely stopped himself from yelling out an impression of Homer Simpson as he ran on the treadmill fast. VERY fast! Delightfully fast, in fact.

Still, he could go much faster than this piece of junk let him. At times like these Earth technology sucked, royally.

He decided to stop to find out the results, he was a little curious- okay, a lot.

Anise looked at him, "Very good."

Jack swatted the 'Off' button on the machine as a way of revenge, then he jumped off energetically, "I'm not even sweating, in fact I think that thing's slowing me down." Was there a Tok'ra version of a treadmill? 'cause he could use that.

The Tok'ra practically shoved the silver, metal ball-thingy in his face and told him to squeeze it and he did. The ball was flattened like a pancake.

He saw that Anise looked kinda freaked out, so he handed her the mound of metal- or whatever it was and said, "Sorry."

She took it and went back to consulting her board- folder thing- whatever it was; he brushed off the residue of the crushed ball.

"I believe the armbands have now reached their maximum potential," Anise said a few hours after Jack had crushed the strength ball.

Jack dug his fingers slightly into the crevice around the neon-green diamond light inspecting it as he sat at the end of a hospital bed again, Sam was sitting on the desk to his left and Daniel was standing.

"Anise?" Janet had walked into the room; the Tok'ra turned to look at the doctor. "Can I see you for a moment?"

General Hammond was standing outside the door, as Anise and the doctor walked away from the Infirmary.

Jack flopped back down onto the bed.

in the hallway

"They all have significantly raised body temperatures," informed the doctor feeling concerned and suspicious- concerned for SG1 and suspicious of Anise.

"They are in no danger," stated the Tok'ra trying to convince the doctor quickly.

Janet stared at Anise with distrust and knew that she couldn't get the Tok'ra to inform SG1 and Hammond of the mess their main team was about to get into; not without straight facts anyway. The woman obviously didn't have SG1's best interests in mind.

Janet shook her head, "I disagree." There was no way she was going to let this woman endanger her friends without a fight. She turned to the General, "Their symptoms are indicative of the presence of a virus."

"You are correct," yielded Anise. "My bio-data indicates the armbands released a virus into their systems."

General Hammond's eyes narrowed on Anise, "Doesn't that concern you?"

The auburn-haired doctor glanced at the General and directed a look at him that said: obviously not!

"It must be how the technology accesses the human physiology," Anise said sounding like she was reading from a textbook. "It took a different amount of time for each individual because of each subject's unique reaction to the virus."

Getting heated Janet snapped, "That all speculation! Major Carter's blood work showed a dangerous amount of adrenalin in her system."

Anise angrily retorted, "I object to the interference in my experiments!"

The General wondered if he should even try to settle this argument as Janet flushed slightly with anger, but decided against it for the time being. Being in the middle of two angry women could be detrimental to his wellbeing.

"I object to being kept in the dark about the condition of people whose health I am responsible for!"

"Are you suggesting I would risk their health?"

Ahh, yeah!

"Doctor, we're seeing some really interesting results, are you saying we should discontinue the experiments?" if she said 'yes' he'd stop was Anise was doing- the doctor wasn't given the job at the SGC for nothing.

"Until we know more about the physical affects of this virus, yes," informed Janet. "I say we remove the armbands, and we run more tests to make sure that these changes aren't permanent or damaging." She gave the Tok'ra a pointed look.

Anise turned to General Hammond, "General-"

"No, I'm sorry!" he interrupted firmly. "There's one thing I've learning in my time here. There's nothing wrong with a little prudence when dealing with alien devices."

With a slightly resigned look Anise followed Janet and Hammond back into the room where SG1, minus Teal'c, were.

When Janet, Hammond and Anise were out of the room Jack turned to Sam from where he was lying on the bed, "Carter? Has the armband screwed with your magic yet?" Was Carter going to start blowing things up? 'cause he'd like a fair warning.

Daniel gave them a curious look, opened his mouth to jump in with a question but before he could Jack glared at him; was it so wrong of him to wonder, and therefore ask, about how the existence of the supernatural changed recorded history? For all he knew it wasn't aliens who build the pyramids.

Demons had, apparently, existed before humans and therefore also before the Goa'uld had, supposedly, built the pyramids.

He HAD to get his hands on Giles's books, apparently he had a HUGE collection of information that Daniel didn't know of. It was…it was FASCINATING!

"No, Daniel," warned the man. "That question was not an invitation for you to start prattling on about the pyramids of something-something."

Daniel frowned disappointedly and entertained a brief thought of flying to Sunnydale and borrowing those demon books that 'Giles' guy had in his library- but he dismissed it almost immediately.

"Carter?" prompted Jack.

"Uh, w-well," stammered Sam feeling slightly off put by Daniel's and Jack's little altercation. "No, nothing really." Except-

Jack noticed the look, "Carter?"

"It feels almost as if my- my blood is burning," she knew she seemed a little freaked, it took some getting use to even if you did have memories of having two years of getting used to the supernatural existing. The fact that she was, now, part of the supernatural freaked her out a little. "Even before I put this armband on I could FEEL the magic and the Naquada mixing in my bloodstream…a-and now that the armband is on the feeling is a lot more noticeable."

She tried to shrug off the uneasy feeling, "Basically, sir. I just need to take some time to get used to it." Getting used to magic and Naquada running through her veins definitely was NOT on the job description.

Jack was about to say something but he stopped when the General, Anise and Janet walked back into the room; he heaved himself into a sitting position. Sam slid off the table and stood at Daniel's side as they walked forwards a few paces.

"Based on Dr. Frasier's recommendations, I have decided to stop the experiment temporarily."

"What?" a strange sense of horror swirled around the pit of her stomach as she stared at the General. This was SO unfair! They could have a HUGE advantage over the Goa'uld with this technology!

"Why?" asked Daniel and Jack simultaneously looking almost exactly like she felt.

"We'd like to get a better read on exactly what these things are really doing to you," explained General Hammond."

They're giving us power over the Goa'uld, that's what they're doing! They needed these armbands…for the Goa'uld! It was the only way to destroy them, without them they'd have no chance of stopping the snakes, they were stronger this way! Without the armbands they were weak!

Sam shook those thoughts out of her head and decided to try to persuade the General that taking the armbands off would be a very bad idea, "General-

"I'd rather not do that, sir," put in Jack looking disappointed.

Sam frowned, he didn't sound as disappointed as she felt. Weird.

"I think the armband may be having a narcotic-like effect, wearing them may become addictive, it's just one of the things I'd like to rule out," explained Janet.

Sam felt an irrational wave of anger at the doctor for depriving them of the one chance to actually have an excellent advantage over those ever-annoying snakes and the chance to feel as powerful and free as she did now- it wasn't fair! It was stupid to throw this chance away- what was Janet thinking!?

"Please, take the armbands off," said the General.

"But-" started Sam, she felt her blood start to burn again. Taking the armbands off was a very bad idea.

"Are you refusing to comply with a direct order?" asked General Hammond managing to sound threatening whilst also questioning.

Yes! She was refusing! It was a stupid, totally unfounded order! How could the General be agreeing with Janet?

She looked down at her armband-clad arm and glared, unknown to her and the people in the room her eyes had filled with an unfathomable darkness.

"Uh, a little problem here, sir," said Jack tugging at the armband and, unknowingly, bringing Sam out of her angered thoughts.

"Colonel?"

"Having a hard time complying," informed Jack sounding a little sardonic; he went back to tugging at the armbands.

As the General and the doctor looked at each other, then at Anise who had an expression on her face that said 'the jig's up!' SG1- minus Teal'c, who wasn't in the room, and Sam who was slowly starting to calm down with the knowledge that the armbands might not be coming off after all- looked at Hammond with surprised looks on their faces.

Janet and Anise were sitting opposite General Hammond in the General's office a few hours after SG1 had failed to take the armbands off; they had spent most of the time since then trying to work out a way to remove the technology but with no such luck.

"We have tried everything short of surgically removing their arms," said Janet sarcastically, she threw Anise a dark look.

"We'll hold that option in reserve," the General said sounding faintly wary.

"You must admit, the positive effect is astonishing," argued Anise lightly.

"As long as there's no downside," warned Hammond looking at the Tok'ra with piercing blue eyes.

Anise lowered her head slowly and closed her eyes and then opened them and looked up, "There's no evidence of any downside." That metallic voice was back again.

"Yet," remarked Janet sternly, she threw the other woman a cold look who glared at her disdainfully.

"Find a way to get those armbands off my people," ordered Hammond.

**Sunnydale**

"You didn't even TRY to fight back?" asked Willow incredulously a few hours after he ran into her house. Well okay, the guy NEVER fought back against his dad, ever. But she didn't expect the flight response to danger from him now that he had Jack in his head; he had a soldier in his head so she didn't think he should be afraid of his dad.

Or should he? How would she know? Her parents, neglective or not, had never hurt her- well, not physically anyway. Emotional-hurt was another thing altogether. But, no matter how crappy her mom and dad were she trusted them enough to know that they wouldn't ever use her as a punch bag as Xander's dad did.

"No, well, I RAN," said Xander lying miserably on her bed. "Doesn't THAT count as fighting back?"

Willow shook her head, "Sorry, Xand, I shouldn't have said that." She frowned gloomily as she remembered that many, many times her best friend had been forced take refuge at her house to be away from his abusive parents.

Flashback

1987

Six-year-old Xander Harris banged on his friend's front door so hard his fist hurt, but he ignored the pain as the pain in his other arm was much, much worse, "Will! Willow!"

His ashen face scrunched up as he recognized the emotions in his voice, he hiccupped and banged harder, "WILL!"

The door opened partially to reveal a very short red-haired girl standing on the tips of her toes and clinging to the door handle; still trying to open the door further but not succeeding as she lost her grip and stumbled backwards.

Xander pushed the door further open so that he could run into the house, he shut the door quickly in case his daddy ran up to the house and saw him.

"Xander!" Willow jumped up and down on the balls of her feet as usual, she was a hyperactive child with a lot of pent-up energy that her mommy and daddy never let her burn off. "I tried to reach the handle, it was real high so I couldn't reach it so I had to stand on my tippy-toes and the door opened but not very much-

"Will?" stammered Xander, interrupting her babbling and wringing his hands anxiously. He winced as his arm burned with pain. "Ow."

The redhead's mouth formed a tiny 'o' and then looked scared, "Your daddy was mean again!"

The dark-haired boy cringed as his friend's voice hurt his ears, the girl was always excited about anything and everything- sometimes even nothing; though he didn't know why, her mommy and daddy never smiled or laughed; so he always wondered why his friend was the exact opposite.

He watched as Willow's small, pale face flushed pink with fury, "I'm gonna make him sorry!" with that she stomped to the door and reached for the handle. Well, tried to anyway. "Stupid handle, why are you so high up?!" she growled, stopped stretching upwards and kicked the door.

Xander almost smiled, his friend was funny sometime and very strange- but he liked that about her, she was weird just like him.

Suddenly all he could see was red as Willow threw her arms, with much difficulty, around his neck and hugged him. He liked Willow-hugs, they were the only hugs he got and he always hugged Willow 'cause her parents never hugged her either, "Poor Xander!"

She sniffled and he suddenly realized that tears were running down his face, huh? He hadn't noticed. He just felt real sad but happy that he was with Willow as well, "Y-you can't make my daddy sorry, no one can."

Willow let go of him and pulled him by the arm, the one that wasn't hurting, into the kitchen like always; this had happened MANY times before. As usual the redhead sat him on a stool, she didn't even have to tell him to take his shirt off this time, and then she went to the refrigerator and got a bottle of water out and grabbed a towel.

The girl sniffled sadly as she looked at the angry-red fingernail marks that marred his skin, some of them were bleeding so she soaked the towel with some water and pressed it to the marks.

After cleaning the wounds she grabbed about a dozen Band-Aids and stuck them over all the cuts, "See, all better now."

Xander was glad she played 'Doctor' the way she did, not that he would ever have the heart to tell her that she was playing the game wrong. You were supposed to play 'pretend' doctor but Willow always read her parent's medical handbooks and she was very, VERY smart so she knew how to say most of the big words.

"Thank you, Willow," he mumbled shyly.

"That's okay," said Willow brightly. "You're my bestest friend, okay?" she noticed more blood around his nose. "Ick, missed some!"

She grabbed the wet towel and wiped the blood from Xander's nose, "All better!"

Willow's excitement and brightness was infectious and soon Xander was smiling and then they watched 'Snoopy' on TV which they had almost missed.

end flashback

"Will!" Xander snapped his fingers in front of her face. "Earth to Will!"

Willow jerked out of her memories and smiled at her best friend, "Zoned out."

She frowned; they needed to do something about Xander's parents. They were still hurting him and she didn't like that. She didn't like that at all.

Xander looked at the redheaded girl and saw that she was glaring at her television angrily, "Uh, Will? What's that TV ever done to you?"

Willow smiled at Xander's joke, "I was just thinking…"

"About….what?" he drawled bouncing on the bed slightly. He pushed all thoughts of his parents out of his mind.

Willow said nothing for a moment, "I-I…we should do something about your parents." She stared at him and he was startled at the amount of anger that burned in the girl's eyes, "Your parents shouldn't be allowed to treat you like this."

"Well, yeah," said Xander slowly. "I know that, I always have ever since you told me that YOUR parents had never hit you." Up until then he'd thought that that was the same for every child; he'd thought that that was just the way it worked.

"I think..." she paused thoughtfully. "I think you should stop your dad, when he tried to hit you. Well, take him down." And why not, they were trained to defend themselves- not physically of course; Sam and Jack were trained, not them. But they both remembered how to defend themselves; their minds remembered it but not their bodies. So they were at a physical disadvantage.

"Are you-" he started, and then he stopped. Why not? His dad was just another enemy that he had to defend himself against; just like in Iraq- just like every bad guy he had met off-world. Why was his dad any different?

Because he'd made his life hell from the moment he was born, because every time he'd wanted to fight back he couldn't- he just froze up when it came right down to it.

It wasn't just because his dad was bigger, thicker, stronger and meaner than him; it was because he remembered how weak, worthless and pathetic the man had, and still, made him feel. It was the built-up psychological effects of the abuse that left him unable to fight back, not physical differences between them- though, that didn't exactly make it any easier to stand up for himself.

"Xand?"

Not only that, but what his dad did to him just made him feel…

"Xander?"

…so fucking guilty…

"Xan," he heard Willow say sadly.

…he never did a thing to stop it, he couldn't…

He flinched as Willow hugged him.

…because he was so damn weak and pathetic…

"It's not your fault, Xander."

…he could never do anything right, he was a loser at school, he was as dumb as a post and his own parents loathed him so much his dad had tried to throw him out of the goddamn window when he was seven, his mom had just watched. All because he'd smashed his dad's beer glass on the floor by accident…

"We're gonna make this right, Xand," promised Willow firmly. "I promise I won't let him hurt you anymore."

No…

"No!" snapped Xander suddenly pushing Willow away. "You can't go over there…don't you remember the last time I was stupid enough to let you stay at my house? That's crazy-talk…crazy!"

"I'm not going to let him hurt you anymore," she repeated firmly with her Resolve-face on. "You deserve better than this, Xand."

"No, I don't," spat Xander angrily. "I'm exactly what my dad always calls me, I can't do shit, hell, I even killed my fucking kid!" Huh?

Silence…

"G-god, Xander," whispered Willow looking and sounding horrified. "That wasn't you, it- that wasn't your fault."

Hell, it wasn't even Jack's fault, it was an accident.

"I killed Ch-Charlie," said Xander, his words were strangled. He remembered the nightmares, the soul-killing nightmares that killed a bit of him every night.

Willow went back to hugging him again, but this time it didn't help, nothing could help. He vaguely wondered, in his grief-fogged mind, why he had taken this long to express his feelings over his home-life.

Maybe it was Jack's memories, ever since he knew how he had masked his pain behind his stupid jokes and goofy personality. Because if he made everything seem funnier than it really was it couldn't be THAT bad, could it?

Maybe, Jack's memories- being a soldier, being a POW in Iraq, Charlie- had added too much pain for him to handle and hide away, he had gradually contained his anger and fear over his parents, in was slow so it was easier to build up the walls as he grew up. But this…

…it was too sudden, too much all at one time, and he couldn't hold it all in.

And Willow wouldn't let him, she would never let him hide it or go through it alone, she never had; as long as he'd remembered she'd always been there to make him express his thoughts and emotions over how his parents treated him as well as how the kids in school acted towards him

"Xander, listen to me," pressed Willow looking determined. "You didn't kill Charlie, you weren't even there when in happened, and you didn't even KNOW Charlie existed 'till a few months ago."

He knew she was right, but the memories and the emotions of what had happened said otherwise, nothing anyone could say could make this any better.

Not even Willow.

**SGC**

Sam's fingers literally zipped over the keyboard with an inhuman speed, and then she stopped and waited patiently for the computer to catch up. She was writing a book on Wormhole physics, she had already typed up a one-thousand-page book and barely two hours had passed since she'd started.

"Hey!"

The blonde glanced up at Janet, "Hey!" She'd written SO much in such a short space of time, this had to convince Janet that the armbands shouldn't be taken off.

"What are you working on?"

"I'm writing a book on wormhole physics, but this damn computer isn't fast enough. When the buffer's full I have to wait for it to catch up," complained Sam glaring slightly at the machine.

"You know, we REALLY could use your help," trying to persuade the blonde was proving to be a challenge.

Sam smiled, "You just don't get it, Janet. I don't WANT to take it off."

"Okay, I realize they're making you FEEL really good-

Sam laughed, "Look! I have written a thousand-page book in under two hours! I mean, this is something I've been dying to do but I haven't had the time!" Oh, come on! The armbands are brilliant! Why did she have to be such a nit-picker all the time!?

Janet looked at her friend as though she was fighting a losing battle, "Sam-

"JANET!" she snapped looking at the doctor furiously.

Janet Frasier flinched at the furious tone in her friend's voice, not just that but she could have SWORN that Sam's eyes had flashed black…

Sam went back to typing, obviously dismissing her, so she shook her head and walked away still a little miffed about what she'd seen…

It must have been a trick of the light; or maybe she was getting too stressed; she just didn't know how SG1, especially Sam, could trust Anise over her. She had been looking out for them for over three years and SUDDENLY that Tok'ra woman comes along and now they trusted this stranger over her; they didn't want her opinion anymore; they just dropped her...

Yeah, okay maybe she was overreacting. But under possible alien influence or not- it hurt.

She just hoped that this 'thing' wouldn't continue for too long.


	15. Chapter 15

Sam typed furiously on her laptop, she knew the light in the room she, Daniel and the Colonel were in was almost completely dark but she could see perfectly well; she stopped typing to consider something briefly, her stomach growled with hunger for the billionth time so she grabbed another power-bar and took a bite. She was aching to try out her magic, the only thing was that a camera was in one corner of the room watching her so that was a no-go.

Unless, Sam looked up at the camera to lock in on its position, then she looked back down at her laptop screen keeping the camera in her peripheral sight; she concentrated and she felt the wires to the contraption snap and tear before the camera went dead. The powerful feeling faded away as the magic was done, she didn't mind though because in a few moments she'd be testing her power out.

"This is ridiculous. It was an accident!" complained Jack several feet in front of her, he was slumped in a blue armchair and playing with little, paper flags.

Daniel, who was sitting on a desk to the right of her, flicked through another book and said with the slightest hint of disbelieving, "Siler has a broken arm and a concussion."

"He'll pull through," said Jack, then he glanced at Daniel who was a little behind him and to his right. "I sent flowers."

"You have to admit, it's a little scary. I mean I feel like I could do…anything!" the archaeologist squirmed slightly with pent up energy, he could barely keep him hands still. "And speaking of broken arms- how do you think Xander is doing, back in Sunnydale? And Willow?"

Jack smirked, "Why don't we find out, c'mon- we'll be there in, like, five MINUTES- guarantee it." And why not? They could be there and back for a visit in less than twenty minutes, no one would even know!

Sam and Daniel looked at each other, "Okay," they said simultaneously. They got up eagerly and got ready to 'zip' off to the locker room to get into their civilian clothes, then all at one time their stomachs growled embarrassingly loud. Sam blushed and gulped, "Food?"

"We'll get it along the way."

Seven minutes and twenty-three seconds later

Three gusts of energy sent several vampires flying across the cemetery like cannonballs shot from a cannon; the almost-victims of the vampire attack fled quickly and didn't look back. The three gusts slowed to become people, one blonde woman and two brown-haired men; they looked around to gauge their surroundings and relaxed.

Then they tensed up as the vampires, angry at the interruption, ran at them; they froze in mid-run and rose into the air slowly. Coming to their senses quickly they started thrashing around, "You better let us down, Blondie!"

"Yeah, or we'll eat you and you two boyfriends as well," one of the others sneered arrogantly.

The blonde in question, Sam, smirked at them obviously enjoying herself as she felt the Naquada-soaked magic streaming through her veins; she looked up at them with an expression of drunken giddiness on her smiling face, "Oh, okay." She let them fall from twenty feet and then pushed magic at them recklessly without trying to hone it and control it properly. The vampires blew up with a furious bright-red light which lit up the entire street for a few moments before disappearing as nothing had happened. Some trees behind the now-'deader'-vampire were dead and blackened by her magic, at the next moment the trees seemed to tremble before they disintegrated into soot.

Jack turned to her, "Sweet."

Sam grinned and bounced on her feet energetically as the vampires' dusty remains, along with the tree-soot, blew away silently with the wind leaving total silence in its wake; it was time to pay a certain redhead a visit and hopefully have a fun night filled with playing around with their magic.

Teen Health Class

Sunnydale High School

Willow smirked to herself as the class lecturer, Mr. Whitmore, wrote 'SEX' on the board in front of the class of students, a strand of short red hair tickled her jaw which resulted in the annoying piece of hair being tucked securely behind her ear.

"S-E-X, Sex," Mr. Whitmore turned away from the board and faced the class. "The sex drive in the human animal is intense. How many of us have lost countless productive hours plagued by unwanted sexual thoughts and feelings?"

That question brought her back to her earlier thoughts, Xander had come to her a few days ago saying that Cordelia had tried to kiss him, in the basement, when one of the assassins- a bug guy- had trapped them both. To say Xander was freaked out would have been an understatement; Cordelia, the rich and meanest girl in school had tried to kiss HIM- Xander Harris: Scruff ball of the century.

Maybe she was having a very early mid-life crisis, or maybe it was a spell, this was Sunnydale after all.

Why would Cordelia try to kiss Xander? The last time she checked the girl hated him, she'd made Xander's life a misery- hers too. As if Xander's home life wasn't enough he had to deal with Queen C the rest of the time as well. Speaking of his home life, Willow was in the process of trying to get Xander to tell someone about his parents, it wasn't working too well. He was perpetually in the stage of blaming himself for what happing to him and nothing she said seemed to make the slightest bit of difference. She decided that Xander should stay over at her house, permanently- or at least until his parents noticed, which would only happen if they were sober…which never happened so he was free to stay as long as he wanted to.

Still, they were bound to notice sooner or later and she hoped that Xander would have made up his mind to tell someone by then.

"Of course, for teenagers such as yourselves, these feelings are even more overwhelming. With all sorts of hormones surging through your bodies, compelling you to action, it's often difficult to remember that there ARE negative consequences to, uh, having sex. Would anyone care to offer one such consequence?"

Willow put her hand up, "Pregnancy."

The lecturer nodded, "Thank you, Ms Rosenberg! Among teens unwanted pregnancy is the number one negative consequence of sexual activity. So, as discussed last week, I present you with your offspring." He swept a sheet from two trays of eggs. Willow smiled; it didn't look too excruciatingly boring, not as much as usual. Though school work had always been rather easy for her and she rarely found any good challenges, she had been getting increasingly restless and uninterested as she grew up and now, with Sam's knowledge and skills, she was bored to death and nothing at school entertained her in the slightest.

She sighed as she realized she'd zoned out during the last of the lectures instructions and now everyone was starting to move around the room towards the trays and trying to find a partner, she looked for Xander and saw that he was walking towards her, "Carter, care to be the mother of my child?" he quipped goofily.

Willow snickered, "Sure thing, daddy-Harris." She'd almost stopped noticing the way he tripped over saying her name, she was starting to get used to it. She followed Xander to the front of the class to get their egg. At least it was a practical session and not paperwork.

"So, Will," drawled Xander smugly. "How's your focus, is it caught or….

Willow scowled slightly with frustration, "Are you kidding me? I-I need to find intellectual challenge or I swear I'm gonna shoot myself." She really would, almost bored to tears here!

Xander grinned, "Miss all the technical know-how of being in the SGC?"

"Yes! God yes!" she hissed angrily. "I- I swear my damn brain's going to die from lack of use. This school is a no-brainer, seriously."

Xander held his hands up in mock-surrender, "Oookay, let's not explode here." His buddy was a little weirder than usual- but then again so was he." He couldn't blame her for being bored-stiff at Sunnydale High, even before she got possessed she had been restless because she was so much smarter than most of the teachers in this school and had to do extra work to keep herself at least mildly entertained. She was practically a genius, she always had been- she was first to memorize her ABCs at Kindergarden, though she had already known most of that before she attended. She was always top in the Spelling Bee contests and had always finished her little workbook before anyone else in the class had even got halfway; and that was just through to third grade.

She was tutoring students now, partly so she wouldn't go nuts and partly because she liked helping people- mostly with their studies. Heck, Ms Calendar would have asked her to help her tutor the computer class if she needed the help.

Willow looked guilty, "Sorry, Xan. I'm just so bored here. Not just with the work but with the lack of problems to solve and scientific experiments to carry out. I miss the SGC." She and Xander walked back to her table with their egg now held in his hands. "I mean, we've practically got the same deal here; y'know with the supernatural?"

The dark-haired youth nodded knowingly, "But it's not the same, is it?"

"No, it's not." Then she smiled slightly. "It could be worse, though, right?" Xander put an arm around her shoulders and hugged her.

"You betcha."

Xander pushed open the library door for Willow and they entered talking quietly to each other, he noticed that their blonde friend was looking through some cards and that Giles was in the cage behind her obviously looking through some books. Willow slapped his arm lightly at a joke that he whispered in her ear.

Grinning, she said, "Buffy! How come you weren't in class?"

"Vampire issues," she explained. "Did Mr. Whitmore notice I was tardy?"

Xander raised his eyebrows, "I think the word you're searching for is 'absent'."

Willow nodded agreeing, "Tardy people show." She watched her friend groan and smiled sympathetically, though she wished that she had been there- fighting vamps would have been more interesting than what they'd studied in class.

"Right," mumbled Buffy then she looked at Willow closely. "Nice outfit, it suits you." Willow had a light blue shirt with long sleeves under a denim-blue sleeveless vest jacket and blue jeans- which weren't baggy like they usually were. And black shoes that made her about an inch taller, all in all it made her look more confident and grown up.

Willow smiled, "Thanks, Buff." She absently stuck her thumbs in the back pockets of her jeans as she wondered when her absentee-parents were going to return from their book tour, would they notice the change in her? They probably wouldn't, but what if they did? They probably think she was going through a phase of teenage rebellion and then go on another trip away from the States for yet ANOTHER five months, which happened to go right through her birthday. Not that they'd remember that either.

She'd stopped hoping for their attention months ago, she should have given up on it long before then. All the times she had been crushed by them, all the times she'd been lied to and forgotten about; she didn't know why it had taken THIS long for her to figure out that she obviously meant nothing to them. Her seventeenth birthday would be just like the other sixteen, just like any other day; the only difference would be that their absence and neglect would be felt a lot more than usual.

The only time she remembered her parents actually giving her a present was the day when Buffy came into her and Xander's lives; when Cordelia had insulted her yet again about the dress she was wearing- the 'Softer side of Seers' dress which also happened to be the present that her mom and dad had FINALLY remembered to get for her.

Almost five months late, THAT had been her fifteenth birthday present, a late one. Seven months before her sixteenth.

Although, it was mailed; her parents hadn't given it to her in person, it still felt nice that for once they'd thought of her while they were working on their much-loved jobs. She hadn't really even cared what Cordelia had said about it, the usual insults hadn't hurt as much that time.

Willow jumped in alarm as she felt a hand on her shoulder, she saw that Buffy, Xander and Giles were looking at her concerned, "I- uh, I just zoned out for second…sorry." She shifted slightly feeling uncomfortable.

She pushed the lingering emotions of her parents' rejection to the back of her mind and smiled, "Uh, Mr. Whitmore wanted me to give you this." She handed the egg to the Slayer carefully.

Buffy rolled the egg around in her hand, "As far as punishments go this is fairly abstract."

Willow smiled, "No! It's your baby, he gave us an egg each between two people to share responsibility for raising it, y'know taking care of it like parents until they hatch." She then sighed and muttered, "That sounded so much more interesting out loud than in my head."

Xander caught what she said and smiled at her understandingly, he did understand a little. He'd rather be at the SGC too but still, this knew intelligence thing was fun and he liked getting good grades that he barely had to study for. He also loved it when the teachers gaped at him when he answered questions correctly or he did well on a test.

"I can't do this!" moaned Buffy. "I can't take care of things. I killed my Giga pet. Literally, I sat on it and it broke."

Buffy put the egg down on top of the catalog, moaned again and quickly walked over to a book re-shelving cart as Xander and Willow watched.

"You'll do fine!" the redhead tried to reassure. No one could get this wrong; it was too easy to get wrong. Buffy would be fine.

"Yes, indeed you will. So, uh, when do we get around to telling these kids that they're adopted?" gotta love parenting, they hadn't had to tell Cassie that she was adopted because, well duh, she already knew.

"I'll just lay that one off on my partner," she looked up, worried. "Who'd I get?"

"Ah, you kinda didn't get one," she explained. "There was an uneven number and you weren't there, so…"

Buffy gaped in shocked disbelief, "I'm a single mother."

Xander Harris nodded, "Oh, the joys of single-parenting." The joke fell flat on the blonde but Willow smiled slightly at it.

"Do you know what this says about me? That I'm doomed to lead my mother's life," she paced around. "How deeply scary it that?"

The dark-haired teen shrugged, "How 'bout this: it says nothing, this whole egg thingamajig is completely pointless and boring and also…pointless."

Willow nodded; her friend was right about that. What did carrying an egg around have to do with parenting? She could be looking at a Naquada generator, but she was holding a damn egg instead.

"Success!" Willow and Xander both tensed automatically at the sudden, loud exclamation that came from the cage. "At last. Your playmate is a fellow of repute, it seems."

Giles came out of the cage and moved to set the book on top of Buffy's egg, the blonde inhaled in fright and quickly snatched it away as Willow and Xander look on in wide-eyed surprise; the librarian pointed out a picture in the book. "That's, um, Lyle Gorch, and that one's his brother, Tector. They're from Abilene. They, uh, they made their reputation by massacring an entire Mexican village in 1886." He took off glasses to clean them.

"Friendly little demons," said Buffy sardonically.

"That was before they became vampires," Giles explained. Buff raised her eyebrows at him and the other two kids exchanged look.

"B-but, um, the good news is that they're…not amongst the great thinkers of our times. I doubt if they're up to much. They're probably just drawn here by the, uh, Hellmouth's energy." He placed his glasses back on his nose.

Xander clapped his hands together, "'nuff said! I propose we slay 'em. Right, Will!" he looked at the redhead excitedly.

"You betcha," she echoed his answer to her earlier question back in the 'Teen health class'. Yeah! They were going to hunt for some vampires, sounded better that taking care of some stinkin' eggs.

Giles looked worried, "I-I don't think you should underestimate them. I mean, y-you may need to have some help if, if, if, if…" he stopped as he noticed the eggs they all had. "Why do you all have eggs?"

Willow smiled, "Get Angel to help you find the Gorches." Having a vampire on your side would definitely help, and then some. She struggled not to laugh at the puzzled expression on Giles's face.

"Yes! Yes, yes, that's not a bad idea. Strength in numbers."

Xander snorted, thinking of Buffy and Deadboy, "Oh, right. I see a lotta demon hunting getting done in THAT scenario." Buffy glared at him.

"Please, like Angel and I are just helpless slaves to passion. Grow up!"

Three blurs shot through the school gates and into the building leaving flurries of paperwork fluttering through the air and a rumpled Principle Snyder sitting on his ass. Snyder got up slowly looking angry, "I'll bet this has something to do with Summers, if it were up to me I'd expel her on the spot, her and her little friends!" grumbling still, he got up and walked inside.


	16. Chapter 16

Willow the astrophysicist chapter 15

Willow the astrophysicist chapter 15

chapter fifteen edited

Three blurs burst through the library doors, the doors swung back into the frames loudly. Sam cringed at the noise as she came to a complete standstill, she wondered whether any of the teachers had heard the racket.

Daniel looked at the stacks of books, there were dozens of them and he bet that they were all full of demon texts and other things to translate, he ran up to the ladder almost immediately after he had burst through the double doors, he grasped the rails tightly and ran up the steps two and a time until he got to the next floor. The archaeologist ran his hand through his hair giddily, his head twisted around in every direction as he tried to decided which bookcase to go to first.

"Hey, Danny," called Jack from below. "Try not to pass out, okay? We can come back later."

Jack looked around, "So, where's Xander and Willow?" the library was completely deserted.

Willow yelped as three blurs of energy shot past almost knocking into her, then she jumped at a sudden crashing sound from behind them, she turned around quickly to look at the library doors. They swung shut loudly, she looked at Xander frowning slightly, "What was that?"

Xander shrugged, "Let's go check it out." He looked back and saw that Buffy, who had gone a little ahead of them, was waiting outside. He saw her look back and then start back up towards them. He turned to his redheaded friend but saw that she was already walking back into the library, "Wait up."

He followed her and saw with surprise that three familiar people were standing around, "No way." He ran into the library quickly filled with dread and anger; he hoped that Buffy and Giles wouldn't see.

He strode in to hear Willow asked, "What are you three doing here?!" she sounded as upset as he felt. This could only go wrong, the only thing they had going for them was that Teal'c obviously hadn't come along for the ride.

"Okay, let me just say that is the stupidest thing you three have ever done," reprimanded Xander furiously. "And second of all…" he heard footsteps running towards the doors. "…hide!"

Xander grabbed Jack's sleeve, which he saw had a weird-looking armband covering it, and pushed him towards the library table, "Xander, what the hell-" he wrenched his arm from the boy's grip which resulting in a pained curse from Xander who was now clutching his arm.

"Geez, are you on steroids or something?!" he exclaimed rubbing his hurt arm. At the corner of his pain-watering eye he saw Willow waving her arms around and hissing at Daniel to hide behind the stacks whilst trying to pull Sam towards the table, she obviously had the same intentions as he did.

"Guys, what the hell is going on?" demanded Buffy taking in her surroundings.

Xander was in the middle of pushing a tall steel-haired man towards the huge table, Willow was gesturing wildly at a guy that looked like he was a cross between Angel and Giles- geeky but cute- to duck behind the stacks while trying to drag a resisting blonde woman in the same direction as Xander was pushing the older man in. They froze immediately and her two friends both had guilty expressions on the flushed faces.

Daniel peeked out from behind the stacks and gave a little wave, "Ah, hi!"

Willow and Xander sighed in resignation, glared at their three friends and then walked towards Buffy. The redhead girl wrung her hands nervously, "They're, um, they're online friends, mine and Xander's online friends; Xander goes online sometimes, y'know I mean he might not look all that bright but I teach him how to work a computer, it's really quite easy…

Xander groaned and rolled his eyes skyward as his friend's babbling pushed its way forward, "Uh, Will?"

"….oh, yeah, I forgot. This is Sam, Jack and, uh, that's Daniel up there behind the stacks…"

Giles, who had came through the doors a minute ago, frowned up at the man holding two very valuable books; the man clutched the books tighter and said, "I'm gonna read your books, I heard they're very fascinating, hope you don't mind."

The librarian spluttered indignantly while Willow continued babbling at Buffy who was looking rather confused and overwhelmed, "Everyone, stop what…" the noise drowned out his words. "I really think you…"

Giles lifted a heavy tome in both his arms and slammed it as hard as he could on the floor, "QUIET!" he yelled. The silence was deafening, he blushed slightly as all of them stared at him, mouths open in shock, he picked up the book calmly and said, "Now, W-Willow, please introduce us to your new friends."

Willow gulped, shifted slightly, and said, "Um, this is Samantha Carter…" gestured towards the blonde she was standing next to. "…the man standing next to Xander is Jack O'Neill…" she then gestured up at the stacks. "…and that's Daniel Jackson."

Giles stared at Daniel, "Daniel Jackson. Doctor Daniel Jackson?" an interesting turn of events.

"Uh, yes of archaeology," answered Daniel looking confused. "How did you know I was a Doctor?" unless he heard of…

"You were giving a lecture on how aliens had built the pyramids in Egypt, a very interesting theory," rattled off Giles, he looked intrigued. "Although, your audience obviously wasn't very open-minded at the time, you were laughed out of the academy because of the theories."

Daniel smiled wryly, "Yes, because people are usually very open to suggestions about alien-built pyramids." If only they knew.

Giles blushed at his sarcasm, then he caught sight of the armband on Daniel's arm, "Um, interesting gadget you have there. May I ask what it is?" it was a very strange-looking machine, he didn't think it was from 'Toys 'R' Us', he certainly hadn't seen them around.

Daniel gaped for a second, then said, "It's…it's a project we're working on…ah…" he looked to his friends for some assistance.

Sam jumped to explain, "We-we work for this computer program company, and well, it's classified so…"

"Ah, yes…

While everyone was talking amongst themselves Buffy gave Willow and Xander a pointed, rather harsh look and said, "Guys, over here." She gestured for them to follow her further away from the group discussion. "What the hell is going on?" she asked expectantly.

"W-we told you, Buff," stammered Willow unconvincingly. "They're our…ah….online friends." Oh, she REALLY wasn't good at lying! Why did she even bother? She didn't even LIKE lying- especially to her friends; maybe that was the reason she lied so badly.

Buffy gave her a deadpan look and said, "Do you even expect me to believe that?"

The redhead shifted, heck no! She wouldn't believe herself if their roles were reversed, she sighed and looked at Xander resignedly, "Buffy-

"Will," he ground out. She knew what the consequences would be like if she told anyone else that knew about the supernatural, she wouldn't tell; would she? Hell no! Keeping secrets had been the center of their universes, their jobs were centered around lying and keeping countless secrets from their families and loved ones, Willow wouldn't tell, no way. It was against everything they were taught.

"You remember what happened at Halloween?" Willow started, making her mind up. "With the costumes." She didn't have to tell her EVERYTHING, she had to omit a few things.

Buffy nodded slowly, wondering where this was going, "Yeah, that stuff is kinda hard to forget, Will." She pulled Willow to the steps which they sat down on; Xander sat on the floor near the redhead and prodded at the wooden rails with his thumb.

Willow took a deep breath, "Xander and I dressed up as soldiers, didn't we?" she wondered how Buffy was going to react to this- how was SG1 going to react to this?

"Yeeess," drew out Buffy, she waved her hand lightly for her to continue.

"Well, Sam and Jack are with the Air force, Colonel Jack O'Neill and Major Samantha Carter," she explained carefully. She looked at Xander who continued the details of their Halloween night.

"When Ethan's spell was cast it didn't just turn us into any soldiers," he inclined his head towards the group. "It turned me into Jack and Willow into Sam." He glanced at his redheaded friend, who continued.

"Since then we've received all their memories, their skills as soldiers, their knowledge," she smiled darkly. "Everything." Jolinar's memories came to mind, it was nothing like having three psyches in your head. Hers, Sam's and Jolinar's. Swell.

Buffy's eyes were wide, "Wow, I mean…wow." No wonder Willow and Xander had been acting differently, she thought it was just because they were growing up; she'd been right, but she'd missed out the other reason. "Wow, so, you know everything that they know?"

Willow nodded, "Pretty much, it's kinda nifty." Sometimes, anyway.

Xander nodded, "Yeah, I got higher grades and everything." He, the dumb-ass goof-ball, was now as intelligent as a guy who flew planes for a living. How cool was that?

The redheaded witch nodded, "Yep, and the only side-effects are soul-crushing night-terrors and a new height of weirdness added to our already freakish behavior."

"Yeah, but that doesn't matter! Now we got a better fashion- Cordelia should be proud, but ya'know what, she isn't, surprise surprise!" joked Xander with a tone of complete and utter self-depreciation and self-mockery.

Buffy swallowed, "You guys are kinda stressed, huh?" well, that much was blindingly obvious. How much had these guys changed? Were they even the people that she'd first met? Yes, she knew they were, just a little different and more mature. More jaded.

Willow and Xander nodded, "Mm-hmm." "How'd ya guess?" the sarcasm came from Xander as usual.

The three of them jumped with shock as a triumphant voice filled the room, "I knew it!" they all turned to see a short, rather bald man staring at the blonde with a gleeful expression, "I knew you were up to something, Summers. What are these strangers doing in here?"

Buffy opened her mouth to reply but found that she had no explanation, "Ah, they're…ah, friends…from…uh…." C'mon, Summers! You can lie better than that!

The small man looked at her the way a fox looks at a rabbit before it pounces, "So, you let them into the school?"

Willow started to get worried, "Oh, no…she didn't…they, ah, kinda got lost?" she winced as the last part of her explanation came out sounding like a question. Well done, Rosenberg. "I-I mean, yeah, they got lost a-and, ah, needed directions. So we gave them those directions and ahhh…." She trailed off as Snyder's glower, which had been trained on her since she'd opened her mouth, got more intense. "They walked in, b-but they're friends…mine and Xander's Internet friends, that is."

Snyder snorted, "You expect me to believe that Harris even KNOWS what the 'Internet' is?"

Sam scowled at the man furiously.

"Hey!" Xander exclaimed looking insulted. He frowned as Snyder glared at him.

Giles scowled at the little man, "Now, see here-

Jack grimaced and stuck his hands in his pockets, "I guess we'll just be headin' off now." Had to do some damage control, if he and his team 'zipped' out of the school Snyder couldn't do anything to get Buffy into any trouble whatsoever. "Carter, Daniel."

Sam looked disappointed, "But, sir." She and Willow hadn't even started having fun yet. Jack glared at her, the look said: 'Are you going to disobey me, Major?' and of course, she wouldn't; not this time anyway.

"B-but Jack," protested Daniel, he held up two books meaningfully.

Snyder glared at them, "Yes, I think that's a good idea. Don't think about coming to this school again, if you're friends with these…these lowlife criminals then I can only expect that you're just as juvenile as they are; so if I catch you around these premises again I'll make sure that what you people have got planned will be stopped and you will be punished.." He had a look of self-importance plastered all over his face as he said this. "Dead students found in the locker rooms, the library last year was all but DESTROYED and all this mess points…to…you."

He said this last part whilst looking at Buffy with nothing short of absolute hatred.

Buffy shifted looking slightly discomforted at this display of animosity, "W-well, that wasn't me."

The principle glared, "I can't prove it was, Summers. But as soon as I find ANY reason for the cops to suspect you of ANYTHING…I'll make sure they'll know EXACTLY where you are, and where you're friends are. Because sooner or later all the massacres and murders that you just HAPPEN to be involved with or near to will be stacked up against you and those too-stupid police cops will corner you and your friends and you will never see the light of day AGAIN!"

As Snyder ranted on and on Sam started getting angrier and angrier; she frowned at the man, how dare he threaten her friends? Over the year and a half he'd given them nothing but trouble at every corner, he constantly stuck his nose in where it didn't belong. These kids had enough to worry about without this jerk making things worse.

She felt the anger burn at the pit of her stomach, it was like a fierce blue flame coming from a Bunsen-burner, it made her feel sick. She watched as Snyder was pushed off his feet by an invisible force and slammed up against the wall behind him, eliciting a 'whoosh' as the breath was knocked out of his lungs. She smiled slightly in satisfaction as the little rat squirmed.

No one noticed that her iris's had darkened to cobalt-blue instead of the river-stone blue that they had once been, her fingertips tingled with an untamed power that made them twitch; she curled her hands into fists and smirked as Snyder yelled, "You put me down now!" he face flushed with anger. "I mean it! I want an orderly school, disciplined, one with NO funny business! No murders! So when I say 'put me down' I mean 'PUT ME DOWN!'" he finished in a high pitched, rather girlish, screech. "This is you, Summers! Isn't it!"

Sam's eyes darkened further to navy-blue as the magic, Naquada and the virus that the armband had released burned inside her and fueled by anger; the lights in the library flickered spasmodically. Some shattered.

Xander and Jack grinned delightedly, and they said "Cool," simultaneously. It wasn't everyday you got to see your 'favourite' high school principle floating around in midair; that was rather unfortunate, still, they could enjoy it while it lasted.

Willow looked at both Jack and Xander, she rolled her eyes at them and then noticed the look on Sam's face; it was then she realized that her blonde solider-friend was the one making it happen. She shook her head, amazed at the blonde's recklessness, and looked upwards at the teacher with wide, emerald-green eyes. She was unable to stop a grin from forming on her face; she noticed that Buffy giggling shamelessly at Snyder's predicament.

The Slayer turned to Willow obviously trying to sober up, "Ah, Will? You are doing this, right? She hoped it was her friend, she's hate to think what would happen if it was a demon doing that.

The redhead shook her head, smirking, "It's Sam, the Halloween thing kinda went both ways." Maybe she should stop Sam, it could get out of hand. No wait, Sam's the responsible adult here, she was always careful about magic and required the same level of caution in Willow.

"Oh," Buffy looked kinda freaked at that. "Great."

"Oh, don't worry, she won't tell anyone." Neither would her friends.

While they talked both the girls vaguely heard Snyder making a rude-sounding comment, then everyone's attention was caught when Jack exclaimed loudly, "Whoa! Carter!" they saw that Sam's hair had darkened to dirty-blonde almost brown, then they heard her say, "Ya know what? I think it's time you became what you REALLY are and stopped harassing these kids."

Daniel's mouth hung open a little, "Uh…"

Sam's eyes had turned solid, pitch black; she started muttering something under her breath and energy began to swirl around her, she shivered noticeably as the energy strengthened and then it started to dissipate.

Willow felt relief as the magic seemed to disappear, she'd thought that her friend was going to attack Snyder; then she felt the same horror as everyone else, minus Sam, did when the Principle screamed as he was consumed by a sudden burst of flame, "Sam!?"

"Carter?! What the hell…" Jack started yelling, the teenager beside him had a sickened look on his face.

Buffy sprinted towards the woman, intent on taking her down, but was stopped a few feet away from her target by an unseen force; then she was thrown backwards into the wall hard and landed on the floor looking dazed.

Xander ran to Buffy's side quickly, looking concerned; his eyes roamed over her searching for any injuries. There were none, she just needed to get her breath back.

"Sam, stop it," he heard Willow say. He looked up and saw that his best friend was inching closer and closer to the blonde- well, brunette now- and was trying not to provoke an attack.

Willow looked at the place where Snyder had been moments ago and then back at her friend, she felt an expression of fear make its way over her expressive face and attempted to conceal it. Of course it proved futile. "What did you do, Sam?"

Why was Sam like this? She knew her, more than anyone, and this was definitely not something the astrophysicist would do. Was it because of the magic? Was magic making her evil? No, how could it- Willow didn't feel evil.

Sam smirked, "Jeez, Will. Don't have a heart attack." God, that girl could be SO uptight sometimes! She needed to loosen up; and as soon as she was done here she would take the redhead out and use some magic, screw the 'professional' side of magic- like you couldn't have FUN with it once in a while.

She saw the girl splutter in horrified astonishment, "'Don't have a-' you- you- you- you just killed-" at the corner of her eye see saw Jack stepping cautiously up to Sam.

Guilt settled at the pit of Sam's stomach as she saw the fear in the girl's eyes and the tearful look on her face, the soldier's hair lightened back to blonde and her eyes went back to cobalt-blue, she looked rather guiltily at the pile of clothes under where Snyder had once been, "I…I didn't kill him, Will, I think I-

Willow frowned suddenly and looked at the pile of clothes….the pile of clothes that lacked the charred look burnt clothes usually had, "But-

Everyone directed their attention to the now-moving pile of clothes and watched in silent surprise as a tiny, pale pink, wiggly nose protruded from out of the garments; whiskers and a tiny furry face soon followed.

Sam nodded, "I think I turned him into a rat." Damn. Well, he did really deserve it.

Buffy, now fully conscious, looked at the rodent-Snyder warily, she looked up at Giles, "Do you think Snyder like cheese?"

Rat-Snyder looked up at the people and squeaked shrilly, its long tail moved around behind it.

Giles took his specs off his nose and polished them furiously, "I don't think he has much of a choice, Buffy."


End file.
